I have decided to abandon my trawl through the failing careers of former Radio 1 DJ’s, for the following reasons. Firstly I started to become concerned that no one else would care much for my almost morbid fascination with this subject, and secondly, all their careers seemed to follow a familiar track in to the abyss unless you exclude Steve Wright who does “Steve Wright in the Afternoon” as a kind of Groundhog Day fixture on Radio 2, such is its pitiful lack of originality in any department except the news bulletins. Some of these former stars have disappeared off the radar completely, suffering from alcoholism and depression, whilst others (Peter Powell and the loathsome Anthea Turner) have had high profile marriage breakdowns and even prison sentences for harassment (Andy Kershaw).

So I have decided to switch subjects and and make a frank admission about the huge Rugby contest that took place between England and Ireland last weekend in Dublin. My admission is this. Despite not having an ounce of Irish blood in my system, I quite enjoyed the humiliating battering that England took at the weekend. I am not sure why, but I think it was part seeing all the toffs in their tweed hats and Barbour jackets having the grins wiped off their podgy rosy cheeks and part being able to chuckle to myself about some of  the people I know, who try to make out that Rugby has some sort of moral high ground as a gentleman’s game as opposed to those diving cheats in football. Football has plenty of problems, but I have never seen a footballer gouge an opponents eye out or attempt to snap an opponent in half with a spear tackle. Neither have I seen a footballer swallow blood capsule in attempt to gain advantage before trying to frame a young female doctor for the offence. Maybe that’s just me being picky, but Rugby fans ought to button it sometimes.

I am not (had you guessed) a huge Rugby fan, but I do enjoy the six nations tournament where the standard has risen in the last twenty years from a game between thirty beer monsters with big guts, cauliflower ears and ill fitting thick cotton kits, to a quite ferocious battle of hard hits between super humans who could tear my head of its shoulders with a gentle tug. Some of the tackles they take, and make, have me wincing behind cushions. How they have got to that size is beyond me, but I am convinced there must be steroid abuse in there somewhere. However, despite enjoying these games as a spectacle, I just don’t get the national pride in Rugby as I do in other sports because it is ingrained in me to think that these players and supporters come from elitist groups where they are taught that they are of a better class and creed than anyone else. That makes me want to see their upper class faces ground in the mud or at least to be shown the recently produced Grand Slam 2011 video. Go on, watch this.

However, I am incredibly two faced at times, because having said all these terrible things about Rugby players and being supportive of footballers, I have to say, I hate English footballers and international football a lot more than England Rugby players, who I merely just don’t have a lot of time for. This week we have seen John Terry, King of the Cretins, bizarrely reinstated as captain of the national team for an up and coming fixture versus Wales at the Millennium stadium. Twenty years ago I would have relished this fixture and looked forward to it all week, but now, such is my apathy to the international game, I probably won’t even watch it. This not just about the players, it goes back to a corrupt World cup in 2010 that featured plastic footballs, vuvuzelas, club before country European players (Ronaldo, Messi, Rooney, Kaka) and Sepp fucking Blatter, sport’s most corrupt toad of all. International football is a mess.

This leaves me with the flagging England cricket team and my humble little football club (Reading FC) to support. The cricketers are wobbling along and will soon be knocked out of their misery in a tournament featuring the form of the game I care for only moderately, whilst Reading are offering late but feint hope of a miracle to at least keep the season interesting before, what I suspect, will be a brave, but empty end.

Anyone fancy a game of tiddlywinks before it turns professional?