Welcome to The Moodie Blog
New Zealand rugby fans have a well-deserved reputation for taking their sport a mite too seriously. And why not? After all, in the words of the Ka Mate haka, “It is death! It is death! It is life! It is life!”
Here at The Cup is Coming Home we plan to bring a little light to the All Black scenario; some occasional levity when the pressure of watching your favourite team (whoever it is) mounts and as elusive Rugby World Cup glory nears.
I have been in the publishing business for 25 years, almost all of it in England’s pleasant pastures as opposed to my native New Zealand. During that period I have seen six Rugby World Cups come and go, and only one – the original back in 1987, the year I left my home country – fall into those magnificent, ball-catching hands of the All Blacks.
I have learned to admire, though not to love, the 15-man game as played in England and indeed all around the world. I know Welshmen, Irishmen, Englishmen, South Africans, French and Aussies who are every bit as fanatically passionate about this great game as I am, and who, too, see the four years between Rugby World Cups as mere time wasting before the only thing in life that really matters.
We’ll try to capture that multi-national passion on The Cup is Coming Home and we’re looking to you, our readers, to come with us, and share, the greatest journey of all.