Theory about historically successful teams
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@MajorRage said in Theory about historically successful teams:
The thing about the AB's is also about the internal marketing.
Compare the percentage of school kids who have actually met an All Black to Austrlians that have met a Wallaby / Baggy Green
Excellent point - you have to live in a very small part of Sydney to even clap eyes on a Wallaby down the street. They seem to get to schools rarely, though that was changing under McKenzie with the country tours etc.
But its not the big name blokes a lot of the time. Which is not to say they don't do it:
http://www.rugby.com.au/videos/2016/10/27/04/00/wallabies-visit-schools
But when you're the minority sport in the nation its just less frequent. Throw in the travel that the average Super Rugby Wallaby does compared to an AFL* / NRL* player and its like sighting a unicorn.
- Obviously there is a fairly hefty peptides / three-strikes drug policy / spouse-beating schedule to keep up. But that's just up the road, not in another whole country!
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It's a natural thing. Any team that wins with the consistency that the All Blacks do will cop a lot of people wanting them to lose. NZ are far from alone in this, it's in every sport. The slight difference is that there are not that many major sports where one team has been so dominant, so you guys are bound to cop it more.
I too, do not get the arrogance thing about the team, some fans for sure, but then again, that's usual. The thing that would grate for me is the repetitive unfounded accusations that seem to become entrenched - poaching, cheating influencing refs.
And on that note I shall leave you with a quote from this thread:-
"English rugby is probably quite good in that department if you only count private schools with shockingly high fees." -
@akan004 said in Theory about historically successful teams:
AB fans are far from perfect. We tend to be dismissive of other teams, we often overrate how good we are and can come across as being incredibly arrogant at times.
As for opposition fans, they seem to think that it's perfectly ok to constantly throw accusations of the ABs cheating, being given the rub of the green from the refs and the arrogance displayed by the team etc and not expect retaliation. As other have said, these claims are almost always unfounded. But what is even more annoying is when kiwis then go in to bat for the ABs, we are accused of being bad winners etc. The old "can't you just enjoy supporting this great team instead of..." line is a favourite of a non AB supporter. So essentially it's ok for them to bash the ABs but we are not allowed to defend them.
I think if you asked All Blacks fans 18 games ago, most of us would have expected us to lose in the next 18 games. I think you could argue our success has taken a lot of our fans by surprise. I think we do tend to lack knowledge about Northern Hemisphere rugby but then again a lot of us don't have the Rugby Channel.
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@Catogrande Am I wrong though Catogrande? Would it be fair to say that the posh english schools have much better access to the English rugby team than your average local state school?
Happy to take back if so - it may be an incorrect perception, which can be corrected on no problems.
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@MajorRage The perception is really quite wrong MR, there is a lot of access to the England squad for schools and junior rugby, with many initiatives all over the country providing participation between youngsters and the squad. Schools can be a little problematic in that it is down to the staff of the school to allow or encourage any interaction. It is highly likely that in percentage terms there is a far greater element of public schools (actually these are the private schools for those who do not understand the idiosyncracies of English schooling) that will facilitate any participation, but this is not confined to rugby or even to sport in general.
A typical illustration of this concerned a guy I met whilst out on the lash. He is a professor of forensic science and he gives freely of his time to schools. He has a few presentations of about an hour each that are very interesting, particularly to early teenagers. All sorts of criminal forensics, gory pictures and lurid stories but all with a scientific base. He offered to do one or more of these for my daughter's school. I contacted the head of science who didn't bother to reply, I then contacted the Headmaster and he promised to get a reply to me and the head of science basically said there was no room in the school calendar (this without knowing anything about the timings being offered - which were totally flexible). My daughter had talked to a load of her school mates who were really keen but no luck. I told the professor this and he said that sadly this was the reaction from the majority of state schools whereas the majority of the public schools were very supportive.
So, it is easy to see how such a perception sticks.
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@Catogrande Thanks Cato, consider myself educated. Interesting p.o.v you have there, given that i'm out to put my 5 year old into the UK education systems and are tossing up between State & Public.
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@MajorRage It would be helpful if either choice would guarantee a good education but alas that is not the case. It is very much down to the individual schools and the catchment area/demographics. Some state schools are brilliant but many are not. Public schools very much dependent upon the school head. One of the major public schools was described thus to me.
The students graduate with a slightly below average education but an above average sense of their own worth.
Research is king mate.
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@Catogrande Shit-Oh-Dear.
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@MajorRage Don't be too downhearted mate. As long as you and Mrs MR put in a shift each week you should be able to unlearn your nipper of some of the crap that gets fed to them.
Here's a really special case at my kids' senior school (up to GCSE) from the science teacher - "There is enough energy in a ham sandwich to allow a person to climb Mt Everest"!
Said "science" teacher also put a scare into the kids about bird flu telling the class that she had bought some tamiflu on the internet and that it is running out because the Government was stockpiling it for "essential occupations".
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@barbarian said in Theory about historically successful teams:
So the ABs are a historically successful team, and have been for some time. ...
And now it seems they have attracted the scorn of pundits and fans around the world. ... their nefarious tactics (eye gouging, niggle off the ball, constantly infringing), their cozy relationship with referees, issues with 'attitude' and 'entitlement' (eg shagging birds in disabled toilets), and a general longing from most fans that they will flat out lose.
Here is my theory, and maybe it's stating the bleeding obvious... this treatment isn't so much to do with the ABs, in fact it happens to most, if not all, historically successful teams.
Admittedly I don't have a huge number of examples to support this, but here are a few off the top of my head:
Australian cricket team of the early 2000s - set the record for consecutive test wins, and the 'hard edge' they were lauded for early in Steve Waugh's reign became a lightning rod for criticism. They attracted a pretty solid opposition around the world for boorish tactics (esp from Hayden, McGrath, Warne, Ponting, Waugh).
...I see it all in fairly simple terms - it is child-like jealousy which deserves to be ignored.
When your favority fave isn't good enough, when your "arguably on paper best in the world" isn't, you make stuff up about the other mob. Discovering ESPN-like data bases is especially helpful as are 7 second video clips proving habitual cheating cheatery by everyone other then our lot. That is, if you are a shrill 14 year old who has no idea how it feels to have your face buried in the cricket pitch, top dressed for winter with more gravel than loam, laid by the local council's lowest tenderer.
It doesn't only emanate from the game's infant supporters. I recall walking across the car park to the Sydney Cricket Ground in the early '90s, in grand anticipation of seeing the Springboks in action here for the first time in twenty years. I was with the Eastwood Club crew - our Marty Roebuck was at full back and his protégé Matt Burke was on the threshold of Wallaby selection. Listening to a couple of older blokes I couldn't believe their vitriol towards the Springboks.
It took me a while to work that out. It was not the apartheid issue, the Springboks hadn't done anything wrong. It came down to envy of the Springboks' past success.
"Until the 1990s South Africa were considered one of the most successful rugby nations in Test match history, with a positive win-loss ratio against every Test playing nation including their traditional rivals, New Zealand. (from Wikipedia)"
This also highlights the fact that people forget that the game goes through cycles. It took fifty years for the All Blacks to win a series over there on their turf.
Just last week I listened to an interview of Michael Cheika by Graeme Hughes, Peter Tunks and Brett Papworth on Hughes' Talkin' Sport radio program. Cheika said that most of the Wallabies have little knowledge of what and who went before them and that he was attempting to educate them with his high regard for the traditions of the game. You'd reckon profit motive alone would have players studying footage of Little's beautifully balanced running, and of where Poidevin and David Wilson were running to and what they did when they got there.
If the fans' attitudes cannot mature into an appreciation of the marvelous Blanco, the superiority of Porta, Michael Jones and Teichmann and the craft of Castrogiovanni - and of the excellence of the All Blacks - they are denying themselves an affection for all that the game offers. They are choosing to be miserable for long periods of their time following rugby.
"I don't have a huge number of examples to support this"
I'm flat out finding any. The ruthless Australian XI under the best captain I have seen, the demanding Ian Chappell, didn't cop any of this jealousy, nor did Clive Lloyd's exceptional West Indies.
Chappelli's team got away with more than Steve Waugh's lot, who plied their trade in the modern era when whinging about excellence became de rigueur. They also got plenty from the politicking anti-sport mob who reckon young blokes must cease on field bullying, that they should attend cooking classes and stand aside to let wymminses past them and into the best jobs.
St George weren't hated during their dozen or so rugby league premiership years, they were held in awe. Brisbane Broncos weren't much liked but that was more about interstate rivalry I believe.
My only example is Greg Norman, who rocketed to the top and didn't pay homage en route to the Aussie rat pack of Shearer, Newton, Davis and others. He stood aloof, singularly focused and successful and was criticised for it. That continued through his best years, notwithstanding that he did more to promote Australian golf than any player before him or since. Attacks by the media and fans accusing him of "choking" were a bloody disgrace. I feel similarly about the same accusation against the All Blacks in the World Cup. Other golfers / teams were better on the day and that is all it was.
That term holds as much substance to me as the stupid "X factor" bandied about in recent years by inarticulate dills who are incapable of putting into words the specific capabilities they see in a player.
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I do enjoy your work on here Mick. Great stuff.
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@Catogrande said in Theory about historically successful teams:
@MajorRage Don't be too downhearted mate. As long as you and Mrs MR put in a shift each week you should be able to unlearn your nipper of some of the crap that gets fed to them.
Here's a really special case at my kids' senior school (up to GCSE) from the science teacher - "There is enough energy in a ham sandwich to allow a person to climb Mt Everest"!
Said "science" teacher also put a scare into the kids about bird flu telling the class that she had bought some tamiflu on the internet and that it is running out because the Government was stockpiling it for "essential occupations".
How big is the ham sandwich?
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@Catogrande said in Theory about historically successful teams:
@MajorRage Don't be too downhearted mate. As long as you and Mrs MR put in a shift each week you should be able to unlearn your nipper of some of the crap that gets fed to them.
Here's a really special case at my kids' senior school (up to GCSE) from the science teacher - "There is enough energy in a ham sandwich to allow a person to climb Mt Everest"!
Said "science" teacher also put a scare into the kids about bird flu telling the class that she had bought some tamiflu on the internet and that it is running out because the Government was stockpiling it for "essential occupations".
Reminds me of this, a poster from the Carbon Trust UK, which is funded by government grant money!
Someone else crunched the numbers, but very quickly:
The photocopier in that photo (Canon 6255i) uses 0.9 W on standby mode, as per the manual.
Assuming its used 9am-5pm, that's 16 h per day on standby, or 14.4 Wh
A cup of tea is 300 mL, cold water is 5°C, tea has roughly the specific heat capacity of water, 4.184 J/g°C, and a density of 1 g/mLQ=mc∆T, = 3004.184(100-5) = 119,244 J
1 Wh = 1 J/s * h -> 1 Wh = J*(h/s) = 119,244/3,600 = 33.123 Wh
So a photocopier left on standby overnight uses the same energy it takes to make 43% of one cup of tea, not 30. Dipshits.
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@TeWaio said in Theory about historically successful teams:
So a photocopier left on standby overnight uses the same energy it takes to make 43% of one cup of tea, not 30. Dipshits.
And THAT is what happens when the marketing department take the facts and fuck with them.
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@No-Quarter said in Theory about historically successful teams:
I do enjoy your work on here Mick. Great stuff.
Thank you No Quarter for your kind comment.
I draw much satisfaction from putting my observations forward especially when the matter involves history of which younger rugby men may not be aware. I now have the time to do that as I attempt to retire - the buggers keep drawing me back in - and I am pleased that my love for the game has not waned over the decades.
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out of interest I googled for that photocopier thing, this is the source's calculation (https://www.carbontrust.com/media/252410/carbon-trust-poster-calculations.pdf)
Assumption
"A photocopier left on standby overnight wastes enough energy to make 30 cups of tea."
Calculation
Assuming a photocopier on standby uses 0.042kW, and is left on when the building is unoccupied for 14 hours (6pm-8am). Assuming cup of tea is 0.25 litres.
0.042kW x 14 hours = 0.588kWh.
Average cup of tea = 0.25 litres = 0.25kg.
Energy used to make cup of tea = 0.25kg x heat capacity of water (4200j/kg/˚C) x temperature rise (90˚C - 20˚C) = 73,500 joules = 0.02kWh.
0.588kWh/0.02kWh = 29.4 cups of tea.conclusion: they got themselves one big ass photocopier (and warm cold water)
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@Tordah said in Theory about historically successful teams:
out of interest I googled for that photocopier thing, this is the source's calculation (https://www.carbontrust.com/media/252410/carbon-trust-poster-calculations.pdf)
Assumption
"A photocopier left on standby overnight wastes enough energy to make 30 cups of tea."
Calculation
Assuming a photocopier on standby uses 0.042kW, and is left on when the building is unoccupied for 14 hours (6pm-8am). Assuming cup of tea is 0.25 litres.
0.042kW x 14 hours = 0.588kWh.
Average cup of tea = 0.25 litres = 0.25kg.
Energy used to make cup of tea = 0.25kg x heat capacity of water (4200j/kg/˚C) x temperature rise (90˚C - 20˚C) = 73,500 joules = 0.02kWh.
0.588kWh/0.02kWh = 29.4 cups of tea.conclusion: they got themselves one big ass photocopier (and warm cold water)
Yep, just a casual 47x more energy used from one photocopier to another!
