Sensationalist Horse@$^&

Is anyone else sick of sensationalist headlines?  “Cruden remains in Exile”  “Ben Flower and Wigan Warriors players urged to ‘knock people out’ by coach Shaun Wane ahead of games”

Neither of these statements are true in relation to what is happening now.

Aaron Cruden missed the the plane to Argentina and was subsequently replaced by Beauden Barrett who played reasonably well.  And his first five eighth replacement, Colin Slade, has played very well all season, including taking some massive hits and bouncing back up – tough guy. This means that the current number one side for the All Blacks doesn’t include Aaron Cruden. He needs to play his way back into the first choice number 10 jersey. And, given that Mr. Carter is going to be back sooner or later he’d better play well. Exile – my arse.

The second headline this week that made me cringe was the Ben Flower/Shaun Wane thing. If you’ve been living under a rock you won’t realise that Ben Flower knocked Lance Hohaia out then punched him while he was down and out. This forced both players out of the game – Hohaia because he was in Disneyland and Flower because he made a stupid error in judgement and was sent from the field. A headline came out of the Telegraph in England saying Shaun Wane – the Wigan Coach – urged his team to knock people out. Given the timing seemed like an awful thing to say and Shaun Wane may be the villain in this Grand Final incident against former Warrior Hohaia. What is really the case is that in the world club challenge earlier in the year – ironically enough against the Warriors – he urged his team to do that. Not before the final on Sunday. It doesn’t make Shaun Wane less of a meathead for saying such a thing but making it out to seem like this was the cause of Ben Flower’s attack is tabloid journalism.

My point is, why can’t certain journalists report the news and issues and let their witty repartee bring the readers in? Perhaps these writers aren’t writers (like me), perhaps they’re newspaper salesmen?

Don’t know – what I do know is now that these dickheads have reported such headlines – the rumour mill churns wildly and we get stupid reactions from an unwitting public – like death threats. Keep it clean fullas and fullessas.

Peace