IT starts at Auckland airport customs and grows from there.
When Wallaby great Tim Horan closes his eyes and thinks of the infamous Eden Park curse, he recalls an aura that assaults your senses long before you lace on your boots.
“It starts from the time you arrive at customs in Auckland,” Horan said of Australia’s winless streak there since 1986.
“The customs guys get you to take your boots out – they might be spotless but they will still move you across to the side and find some dirt on your boots.”
“They will hold you for another 15 minutes or so while they check it out.”
Then there’s the match-day bus trip to the ground which can move slower than a country stream in dry season.
“There are always people in All Black jerseys and black tracksuit pants banging on the side of the bus.”
“You come down the streets from the city and it is not that far but the bus always takes a long time to get there. There are always traffic jams.”
Then comes the walk among the natives no player relishes.
“In the early days when our bus arrived, they made you park a street away,” Horan said.
Wallaby great, Tim Horan
“For some reason they would not let us park outside the dressingroom. You had to walk a street and a half around the block. You would get peppered from the public having barbecues in their house.”
Finally, the team would reach a dressingroom that had all the warmth of a highway petrol station.
“The dressingrooms always seemed cold there. Most dressingrooms are warm. I remember Eden Park rooms being cold and stark,” Horan said.
“I’m not sure about the home dressingrooms but I reckon they might have been three times as big with maybe a spa as well. I bet they had warm showers.”
And finally comes the ground itself.
“You would walk out on the ground and you could just feel that aura. You were walking into a church. Eden Park is their cathedral and you are not allowed to win there. You are not going to be let out winning a game,” Horan said.
“The pitch is a bit heavy (compared) to normal pitches.”
“To play an open brand of rugby is quite difficult because the grass is a bit longer. The ball does skid off the turf a bit. You have got to play somewhere between wet and dry weather football, whether it is a dry night or not.”
Horan never won at Eden Park for Queensland or Australia but gives Australia a strong chance of breaking the curse on Saturday.
“I give us a big chance. I like the momentum we have,” he said.
“I think the All Blacks will be very nervous about the opportunity the Wallabies think they have here. There is no pressure on the Wallabies.”
But he knows it is never easy.
“I have strong memories of leaving there and just wanting to get out,” Horan said.
“For some reason they would not let us park outside the dressingroom. You had to walk a street and a half around the block. You would get peppered from the public having barbecues in their house.”
Sounds a bit like the old Riebeeck stadium in OKE, except those miners didn’t through things at you from their homes, they tried to get you drunk by offering Richelieu and Coke over the fence…
@ Pietman:
“…didn’t throw things…” eish, sorry Puma!
@ Pietman:
I don’t think the ride to Ellis Park is any easier Pietman 😆
I just love these type of stories and insights
Good cut and paste.
Barbecues inside their houses sound dodgy though.
We need to hear Blackpanty’s take on this?
😆
@ nortierd:
I think this year we must get the bus driver to take a detour to Ellis Park through “little Nigeria” and make sure he catches every traffic light red. That’ll fuck’em.
gunther wrote:
I think they make the fire on the floor in the kitchen and open the window to serve as “chimney”.
@ IAAS:
Not a bad idea.
The problem is, after the Eden Park test last year there was a massive build up of hostility for the Ellis Park test, remember how people reacted?
Yet, they came in from Argentina and duly still farked us up, hostility and all.
Maybe we must give them the silent treatment?
Put them in Conventry perhaps 😆
IAAS wrote:
Not even Soweto scared them either
@ gunther:
@ IAAS:
Must say, those dressing rooms at Eden park sounds a bit like that makeshift morgue at GrootBlouBegrafnisondernemer’s plot in the Panne…
Never heard our Saffa teams bleat about the facilities though, but then again, we are only guests there and we were brought up to accept things as they are at our hosts’ home….
@ IAAS:
Yes choke them with dodgy cellphone chargers and fake sunglasses
@ gunther:
Driving through the ‘Brow with the bus doors open? Another good idea.
They won’t have recovered come the haka.
You’ll still see the whites of their eyes in row WW. 😀
9 @ Pietman:
Hey, I’m not a maplotter!
Come to think of it, a lot of the yards here in the Panne, looks like a maplotter paradise.. lots of farktup cars all over the place!
and little ol’ ignorant me here always believed new zealanders were such welcoming, hospitable, dignified and friendly people…who respected and got on with the greater global rugby brotherhood…? 😯
or is it only aucklanders who are new zealanders behaving badly…? 🙄
can any of our kiwi mates help me here…? (i know you’ll say we saffas are the worse… but (some of) you guys seem to think and believe the worst of all saffers so you wouldn’t expect us to be friendly and hospitable in the first place…)
silly me… guess i should scratch a trip to kiwiland off my bucket list… 🙁
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