Sissies have taken over the farm!

Me mate Blue calls it the darkest day and the most disgraceful chapter in the history of rugby league.
I'm referrring, those few true league fans still left, to the Craig Gower and Brad Fittler scandals. Let's take the Gower scandal first.
The scandal, that is, of the bastard bed-wetting wowsers of the ARL arsing young Gower from the Australian side for the triffling offence of flashing his not-so-old fellow in a Sydney bayside pub.
Didn't it make you want to spew! Swear off the debased game for life!
Hearing the news on the tele the other day left the Bash speechless. Incapable of getting off me bean bag to grab the phone and tell that NRL imposter Neil Whitlacker to get a woolly one up his clacker!
Well, it was either the news or the two four-litre cartons of brown muscat Blue and I had drunk that afternoon that caused my lack of physical reaction to this pathetic news. The best I could muster was enough strength to throw my prized 20 year old glass goonie of muscat at the tele news reader.
Judas H Christ, true league fans, what is happening to this once-proud game? Who are these Rex Hunts hell bent on twisting the frivolity of youf into the evil shape of political correctness? Taking the green and gold off Gower before he even got a chance to wear it defies belief!
Now I'm not saying Gower should have gone unpunished. But a $10 fine and a nod and a wink from the NRL judiciary should have been about the extent of any action again the lad for having a rush of blood to his little head. That and a few late-night calls from the sheilas lucky enough to have seen his bed flute unsheathed.
Crikey, I remember those glory days of rugby league in the 60s in the northern suburbs of Brisbane when young men could be young men like that and get away with a little bit of mindless shenanigans.
I remember one weekend after a big game being seven sheets to the wind. I had no recollection of it meself but apparently about midnight on the Saturday I got up on a table at the Norths clubhouse and mooned the club president's wife in front of all her friends. I copped a two quid fine and a week's holiday for that, but only because the coach said my arse wasn't hairy enough for that sort of caper. Christ, I was only in the under 13s!
That was also around the time of the Gorgeous Greek, and no player was more widely idolised at Norths. He was universally beloved by mums, days, grannies and kids - and everyone put in a super-human effort to make sure this average player - but stupendous entertainer - made the field on Saturday. Not the least being the Norths coach, who would drag the Gorgeous Greek out of the Prince of Wales Hotel as regular as clockwork right on the dot of 8pm on Friday nights to prepare the big man for Saturday's assignment.Towards the end of his career, the Georgeous Greek - let's call him Atlas Medusa from now on - was enjoying a family get-together at the aforementioned pub with his brother. Let's call him Zeus.
Atlas and Zeus - apropos no particular reason - decided to drop their dacks. Sorta show the true league fans what the game was all about. Apparently there were humorless bastards in those days, too. Atlas got barred for life. Zeus got 10 years. Why the big difference in the sentences? Zeus was wearing underpants at the time.
But the pub ban was where the disciplinary measures began and ended - as should always be the case: when the club hierarchy heard of the incident, they shrugged their shoulders, then put on free piss for an hour.

And what do you make of the Fittler affair, true league fans?
League's a tough, rough game played by tough, rough men who drink to excess to celebrate a win, drink to excess to commiserate with team-mates over a defeat and, most important of all, drink to excess to anaesthetise all those aches and pains top players take off the paddock every bloody weekend.
Do you know how many times The Bash was found outside a cop shop in a taxi comatosed from the mean soup? Twenty fucking four! And proud of every one of them. Each time drunker than the last.
And what did the boys in blue do about it. Friggin' nothing!
Just a polite thank you to the passenger who had driven me there and a stern warning to me that if I did not mend my ways quick smart, I'd be in grave danger of losing my part-time taxi licence.

Cop-u-lata,

The BASH

p.s: in the next issue, me mate Blue and I will outline our proposed code of conduct for league players to ensure the Gower and Fittler fiascos never happen again!