The new Western Force Super 14 rugby franchise continued their aggressive recruitment drive on Tuesday with the signing of New South Wales prop Gareth Hardy, the third Waratah poached by the Perth-based outfit in as many weeks. The Force have angered rival Australian teams by targeting players up for contract renewal.
Ben Tune made a fairytale comeback to give Queensland a welcome break from their Super 12 miseries against South Africa’s Sharks on Saturday. Tune scored one try, set up two others and was a constant menace to the visitors in his first start in two years as the Reds triumphed 30-25 at Ballymore.
Twin brothers from Russia were due to set off from Western Australia on Friday in a bid to cross the Indian Ocean in a rowboat, Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio reported. Alexander and Sergey Sinelnik (31) hope to be the first to row the 7 400km from Australia to South Africa.
”The Western Force” has received mixed reviews from the local community after it was revealed on Tuesday as the name of the new Western Australian Super 14 rugby team. The name, which supposedly ”best represents a strong, energetic and inclusive rugby team that has a solid connection to the state’s ideals”, has polarised Perth’s sporting fans.
A teenager with a train "obsession" took a stolen tram for a joyride through Australia’s second-biggest city at the weekend, picking up several unsuspecting passengers along the way, police said on Monday. The unidentified 15-year-old allegedly stole two trams within the space of two days from a depot in Melbourne, they said.
It’s make-or-break time for defending champions ACT Brumbies in their return home for the showdown with shaky front-runners New South Wales Waratahs on Saturday. The Brumbies have slumped to fifth spot with five matches left to next month’s playoffs after losing their last three games on the road.
Under-siege Queensland look likely to avert an exodus of key players despite the defection of Wallabies lock Nathan Sharpe to Perth. The Reds have been buoyed by promising prop Greg Holmes signing a new two-year deal, while hooker Stephen Moore has also agreed to stay in Queensland.
Adam Gilchrist says the 2007 World Cup will likely be his last cricket series for Australia. The 33-year-old Gilchrist, the world’s premier wicketkeeper-batsman, told Inside Cricket magazine that he won’t be playing for Australia in three years’ time, domestic media reported on Tuesday.
Perth capped an impressive week of recruiting on Friday with the appointment of former Wallaby prop Ben Darwin assistant forwards coach of the new Super 14 franchise. Darwin is currently head coach of Sydney club Northern Districts and will remain as such until the end of the Tooheys New Cup before relocating to Perth in October.
The Perth Super 14 franchise received its first public knockback on Thursday when in-form fullback Peter Hewat rejected a lucrative offer in favour of re-signing with New South Wales (NSW). Perth have snared two high-profile Wallabies this week in NSW hooker Brenan Cannon and Queensland lock Nathan Sharpe.
The Queensland Reds’ injured-plagued Elton Flatley announced on Wednesday that he is giving up the team captaincy, putting pressure on his stand-in replacement, Nathan Sharpe, not to defect to new Super 14 franchise Perth. Flatley missed the Reds’ past two Super 12 games after being concussed against the Crusaders on March 12.
Wallaby hooker Brendan Cannon became the first player to join Perth’s Super 14 team on Tuesday, signing a two-year contract with the new franchise. The announcement of Cannon’s defection from the Super 12-leading New South Wales (NSW) Waratahs prompted an angry tirade from NSW coach Ewan McKenzie.
Put it this way: those who have a love life are likely to live longer than those who don’t. That’s the conclusion Australian academic Prof Marc Cohen came to after reading through the literature on the link between love and longevity. ”Having love in your life will improve your chances of living a long life,” Cohen said.
The Canterbury Crusaders restored the Super 12 rugby status quo with an ominous victory to burst the unbeaten five-match bubble of the New South Wales Waratahs this weekend. The Auckland Blues smacked ACT Brumbies 17-0, while the Otago Highlanders ground out a 23-16 win over Queensland Reds.
As Indonesians struggled to recover from the second deadly earthquake to strike them in three months, an Australian expert warned on Friday that the country faces the prospect of a ”super volcano” eruption that would dwarf all previous catastrophes. The world’s biggest super volcano is Lake Toba, on Indonesia’s island of Sumatra.
Queensland captain Nathan Sharpe will be forced to keep his emotions in check during Friday night’s clash against the Highlanders after the Reds launched a desperate campaign to retain the Wallabies enforcer. Sharpe, off-contract at the end of the season, is one of several high-profile Queensland players being head-hunted.
New South Wales Waratahs vice-captain Phil Waugh believes his unbeaten side must play mistake-free rugby if it wants to halt the high-scoring Crusaders juggernaut in Saturday’s Super 12 rugby blockbuster at Aussie Stadium. The Waratahs lead the ladder with an immaculate record of five wins from as many fixtures.
Reds flyer Drew Mitchell believes carefully concocted offensive tactics will help Queensland break the Highlanders’ Super 12 defensive stranglehold on Friday night. Mitchell Wednesday revealed Queensland’s coaching staff have pinpointed several weaknesses in their opponents defensive structure that permitted only six tries in five games.
New South Wales fullback Mat Rogers was on Tuesday ruled out of next weekend’s crunch match against Canterbury, handing his in-form understudy Peter Hewat a chance to impress selectors. Rogers has failed to recover from a groin injury sustained in South Africa two weeks ago.
The New South Wales Waratahs may be unbeaten after a month’s Super 12 rugby but the Canterbury Crusaders are the favourites with bookmakers to win their sixth southern-hemisphere provincial crown. The Waratahs have another chance to give their title claims more credibility against South Africa’s Northern Bulls in Sydney on Saturday.
An Australian magazine has offered to pay $1,25-million to anybody who can prove that there is a Tasmanian tiger still alive in the wilderness. The last Tasmanian tiger, or thylacine, is believed to have died in a Hobart zoo in 1936 but since then almost 4 000 sightings of the animal have been reported.
They may be odds-on favourites with the bookies, but history is against the ACT Brumbies overcoming the Sharks in Saturday’s Super 12 match in South Africa. The Brumbies named a strengthened line-up, including gifted fullback Mark Gerard and Wallaby forwards Owen Finegan, Radike Samo and Jeremy Paul, to start against the Sharks at Durban’s Absa Stadium.
Wildlife authorities in Australia were hunting on Friday for a saltwater crocodile after police found the ferocious reptile in a home and released it near a popular swimming hole, thinking it was a relatively harmless freshwater croc, national radio reported. A woman called police after finding the crocodile taped up in her laundry.
New South Wales emerged from a ”difficult week” and made light of the absence of controversial lock Justin Harrison with a 25-10 win over the Stormers at Aussie Stadium on Saturday. The Super 12-leading Waratahs made it four wins from as many starts, though they failed to pick up a bonus point for the first time this season.
Thirty guests tucked into a sheep-shaped cake at a 21st birthday party for a merino who may have set a longevity record for his kind in Australia or even the world, news reports said on Saturday. ”We’ve never ever had a sheep as old as George,” said New South Wales farmer Myra Tolhurst.
Wallaby lock Justin Harrison said on Thursday he will stand down from the New South Wales Waratahs team until a disciplinary hearing investigates a racial comment he admitted making to a South African player in a Super 12 rugby last weekend. ”I’m still coming to terms with the ramifications of what I said,” Harrison said.
Remorseful Waratahs lock Justin Harrison has said he will comply with any suspension or fine meted out after admitting on Wednesday to racially vilifying a black South African rugby player. The towering second-rower owned up to making a racial slur directed towards Cats winger Chumani Booi in last weekend’s Super 12 match in Johannesburg.
A ”super cyclone” packing winds of more than 300kph was bearing down on Australia’s remote north-west coast on Tuesday after already striking the country twice in the east and north. Cyclone Ingrid was upgraded to a category five — the highest level — early on Tuesday over the Timor Sea.
Clyde Rathbone has questioned the viability of a fifth South African franchise in the expanded Super 14 competition, saying there are not enough quality players in the country to support it. A South African franchise will be selected in the coming months to join Perth as the two new teams in the 2006 Super 14 competition.
Wallaby flyhalf Stephen Larkham has had a reality check with his rugby career after he underwent weekend surgery to remove a melanoma behind a knee. The 30-year-old Test star faces an anxious week as he waits to find out whether all the malignant growth has been removed from behind his left knee.
Defending champions ACT Brumbies overcame new injuries on Friday to beat South Africa’s Stormers 22-19 Friday in the Super 12 rugby union competition. Already missing key backline players, the Brumbies suffered a further blow on the eve of the match when centre Gene Fairbanks withdrew because of a facial injury.
South Africa’s Western Stormers may have their best chance for a prestige away win over the ACT Brumbies by fielding an entire backline of Springboks against the injury-hit Super 12 champions in Canberra on Friday. The Australians have been battling-on without several of their leading Wallabies in the opening weeks of the tournament, but it will get no easier against the Cape Town-based outfit.