The right-shaped ball

The Rugby World Cup looms large, behemoth-like, bestriding the horizon like some gargantuan spectre of Welsh rugby failure, taunting the men in red as they wait to test themselves against the great and good of the rugby playing nations that dot this sphere (though the earth is not actually a 'true sphere', lending wait to the idea that God modelled it on what would later become the rugby ball).

Wales warmed up by getting stuffed by France and England and scraping a win against Argentina. The talk is of doom and failure and 'that pikey c*nt'. There is no optimism in the pubs and on the pitches of this small nation, just a sense that we are lambs being led to the slaughter.

Wales will target the quarter-finals and play from there. If - by some miracle - we actually GET to the quarters and then win through to the semis, it's a case of do-or-die and see where we end up.

There will be lots of beer drunk whatever happens. There may even be some rugby played on the way to town, using various ball-substitutes (bottles, potatoes, cabbages, small logs). There may even be some reason to cheer. Time will tell.