Australian Olympic chief said of Rebecca Adlington' swimming gold medal...
"Not bad for a nation with no swimming pools and very little soap."
It would be churlish and so very wrong in all sorts of ways to respond in kind, wouldn't it?
Hattip: The Sun
Having a son, who is now an Aussie. and visiting the country often. The sporting facilities in that great country are simply awesome!
ReplyDeleteGreat humour! Great Competitiveness.
Something this Labour Lot have removed from our once Great Country.
Does the Australian Olympic chief want some salt for that chip on his/her shoulder?
ReplyDeleteI don't know why Australians have such an inferiority complex about the UK. They are far more successful at sport than us (except in rugby union) and should celebrate their no doubt successful Olympic team and not worry about anyone else.
Good luck to our British team - you will always make us proud!
It's a joke and if Britain has plenty of soap, it lacks swimming pools.
ReplyDeleteSwimmers can travel hundreds of miles to find am Olympic sized pool, Paris alone has more Olympic Pools than the entire United Kingdom. A disgrace.
Everyone loves to claim credit for "British" medals at the Olympics but often these are won inspite of the British.
Our athletes still have no decent training facilities, our cyclists and triathletes get abused on the road by White Van Man and run into the ditch by School Run Mum, our sports fields have been turned into supermarkets and 'executive' flats, hockey and rowing are ignored by the media where football tittle tattle is deemed more important than World Championship wins and child "protection" rules add crippling bureaucracy to all youth sport activities.
I know lottery funding is now helping some squads like track cycling, rowing and athletics but I'm sick of the average Brit wrapping themselves in Olympic glory.
Any success during these two weeks from our elite sportsmen and women is usually done in the face of four years of antipathy and sometimes downright hostility from the British public. [/rant!]
I am surprised the Aussies can swim with the ball and chain attached to their ankles....we may have the odd chip on ourn shoulder's, but they still carry the chain's of convictions.
ReplyDeleteBring back transportation to the Colonies!!
French media reported that result as a win for Adlington "l'Australienne", even though they know she is not Australian. They do this regularly when there is a British win, because they cannot bear it - even though their women beat us at archery, they are still smarting from Agincourt. French TV showed the medals table last night, detailing the first eight, leaving out nine (UK) and showing no. 20 (France).
ReplyDeleteNot sure a nation of convicts should be criticising the Mother Country's personal hygiene habits.
ReplyDelete;)
Australia, total contribution too Western Civilization, The Aerial Drier and 400 terms for vomit.
ReplyDeleteIain will 'yer Ol mate Boris be backing the building of three million homes in London, when the Tories force all those Norherners South.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7556937.stm
Our small village in Spain (pop. 350) has an olympic sized swimming pool that was generously provided by EU funding. (i.e. there's no swimming pools in England because the money is being diverted to build unneeded facilities elsewhere in the evil empire).
ReplyDeleteIronically the town council can't afford to open the pool this year.
As to the Australian, his comment sounds pretty much spot on to me.
we can always rely on a balanced response from an australian as they have a chip on both shoulders.
ReplyDeleteThis remark when Australia has unprecedented draught. They may plenty of swimming pools but water for them?!
ReplyDeleteIt's certainly true that we have a lack of long course pools in the UK, however much of that is legacy as we have quite a few of the old long course pools, i.e. 33 and 1/3. Olympic size has not always been metric
ReplyDeletePlease, no more posts about the bloody Olympics or else those of us whom the whole thing sickens will just have to give up your blog until it's all over. Don't be those dictators' friend!
ReplyDeleteIf you can't say anything nasty about it, keep quiet!
There's that old joke - What's the difference between a yogurt and Australia?
ReplyDeleteA yogurt's got culture.
Fair play to her - if the Aussies can't take the mickey then it's a real bad day.
I'll never forget visiting a sports centre on the Central Coast NSW.
ReplyDeleteGreat pool mainly empty - except for me .
Very good gym (no better than lots in England) a few people in it.
Right alongside all this a vast gambling area packed with fat wheezy old smokers all grimly pulling the levers on the one arm bandits wile stuffing their faces with icecream and popcorn.
Yeeah.
I have to say I have always been in favour of the policy they have in Norway (and I think Sweden as well) that mandates that once a town reaches a certain size (couldn’t tell you exactly what it is off the top of my head) they are required to build a swimming pool, a sports hall and an ice rink (I admit I think we could probably ignore the ice rink).
ReplyDeleteWhen they grow bigger still they are required to build even more ports facilities.
Why doesn't the UK have anything like this? I play a type of indoor hockey and the sports halls in this country are unequivocally terrible- no spectator space, leaking roofs, terrible, slippery floors and all insanely expensive- no wonder kids choose fat over football.
The Aussies used to be dominant in Athletics and tennis. No longer. Apparently they have proportionately more obese people than the Yanks.
ReplyDeleteBreaking rocks in Botany Bay doesn't give you the chance to breed. Australians are descended from the warders.
ReplyDeleteMind you, in spite of their chippy shoulders, good luck to them.
Does this mean big mouthed Andy Pandy Burnham gets to wear an Aussie hair shirt? I do hope so.
ReplyDeleteI have never understood why the Aussies, who live in a beautiful country marred only by the fact that it does seem to be used as nature's 'sharps' bin for venomous creatures, are so bloody chippy about the UK.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to have got the impression that 10.00-10.30 every day for every Briton is scheduled for a good half hour's sneer at Australasia, when in fact, whenever I hear fellow brits talk of the continent - which is seldom - it is with warmth and affection. Nor do they seem reluctant to visit a country whose inhabitants they claim to despise.
I could understand such a reaction in yanks, who are pretty much vilified en masse over here for being stupid, obese armed rednecks who'd invade another country for a chicken burger and list 'lynching' as one of their hobbies. But with some exceptions, they seem ready to forgive casual bigotry.
Nope, can't understand it.
So the Australian 'Olympic Chief' has passed judgement and spoken.
ReplyDeleteWe are not worthy.
Jilted John, it's because, for all their self-puffery as a brave independent nation which has thrown off kot-towing to the mother country, they're still beholden to the cultural cringe. They seem obsessed with us and will be for as they continue to define themselves in relation to us.
ReplyDeleteThe essential difference between the two countries? Top British sportsmen tend to be shit. Top Australian sportsmen tend to be shits.
Jilted John, it's because, for all their self-puffery as a brave independent nation which has thrown off kot-towing to the mother country, they're still beholden to the cultural cringe. They seem obsessed with us and will be for as they continue to define themselves in relation to us.
ReplyDeleteThe essential difference between the two countries? Top British sportsmen tend to be shit. Top Australian sportsmen tend to be shits.
It's perfectly understandable - you took one of our gold medals off us! How dare you - and to cap it all - you took the bronze too.
ReplyDeleteHow very dare you! - we had that one earmarked for the mantle piece - now we're just gonna have to sulk.
If you want to know what mass hysteria is like, you should be here in Australia; here if Australia didn't win, you won't see it, and if they get the bronze you will never know who won Silver or Gold.
I always know when the Poms beat us at anything because of the silence on the next day's news.
Says it all really.
I think it is quite good to know that the subject peoples have a sense of humour.
ReplyDeleteYes strapworld, Thatcher's pools were absolutely magnificient weren't there? she spent sooo much money on sports didn't she? Australians are right English are pretty dirty and rubbish at sports, full stop.
ReplyDeleteDon't take it too personal, you are good at making breakfast, binge drinking and underaged sex.
Don't take it too personal,[sic] you are good at making breakfast, binge drinking and underaged sex.
ReplyDeleteWe are great at breakfasts, this is true. But by the Danish legal definition - where an unit is 12g alcohol to the UK's 8 - we're rubbish at binge drinking, and by the Spanish legal definition - where the age of consent is 13 - we're rubbish at underage sex. All depends on looking at it in a full international context.
But by any definition, you're a t*t.
Calm yourself Iain. Australia has my full permission to make jokes about Brits. I never missed an opportunity to make jokes about Aussies when I lived in Oz.
ReplyDeleteIs Oz the only country in the world to make its own version of Carling lager? i.e. the lager is crap.
Australians are as obsessed by Britain as they are with sport. Despite all the UK's faults they can't stop coming here, talking about us, comparing themselves with us. It's the only place outside Australia they care about.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly they're also the world's fattest people, which throws their obsession with sport all the more remarkable. So, fat and chippy - sounds more like a pissed take-away dinner than a nation trying to make out that it's serious (which it isn't). Diddums :)
Typical 15 minute news in Sydney:
ReplyDelete1 minute boring stuff about Sydney;
2 minutes on national on international news;
12 minutes on Australian sports results.