The rugby Six Nations starts this week. Brilliant, I love a rugby international. I can even tolerate the women’s rugby internationals, if I have to. All those thighs bouncing around in the mud; its like a return to the 1970s values, without all the moustaches. Ok, with less moustaches. And, of course, English women’s rugby is the best. They win everything. Which the women footballers do to, but the football is… errrr… is… is somewhat different from my normal expectations of the game.

But the point is: the rugby started last night.

Since when is international rugby played on a Thursday night? Friday night I can forgive. But Thursday night? Its just wrong. Don’t they know I’m at tai chi? Learning how to live forever, and hurt as many people as I can whilst I’m doing so. I can’t just not go because some horribly commercialised tv station has sold its soul to buy the rights and ‘the suits’ have found that the demographic exemplars of rugby followers like to seek their future shopping inspiration on a Thursday night. I don’t know if it happened but they were planning on showing commercials DURING the match!!! Like, they’re preparing for a scrum, let’s relegate that to a corner and fill the rest of the screen with dog-food. Tampons. Mitsubishi cars. Samsung phones. And diet-Coke. Don’t they know that some of us real aficionados need to see the scrum preparations. We need to make sure that every one of the forwards (and the scum-half) has readjusted their jock straps. Pulled out their wedgies. Scratched their bollocks. Its an important part of the game.

So yes, I greatly appreciate it when the rugby is on ‘normal channels’, up to and including Sky, for the purposes of this debate, and hate it when France vs England is on TNT or Disney Plus or Al Jazeera Sudan, because I may have those particular media vehicles but use them so seldom I’ve forgotten how to get on. But putting adverts on during a match is simply immoral. There must be laws, surely?

Ok, it was only France vs Ireland, so no-one really cares about missing that, its not like I’d pass tai chi to see such an inconsequential game. (Games only become ‘consequential’ when England are playing).

So let’s have no more of this ‘midweek madness’. Rugby is for the weekends. And I think ITV should be prosecuted for Contempt of Scrimmage.

Happy Friday

A xxxx