Sam who???

It must be hard, when you're sat in a city centre office in Hull, to contemplate mysterious worlds down under. Tonga, Samoa, heck, they're all the same, they're all hit by tsunamis and earthquakes, eh? Anyway, the rugby league prop Sam Moa has just signed a new two-year deal with Hull FC. With a name like that, I'm sure it was easy to think, from Hull, the Sam must be from Samoa. But no, he's from Tonga. Cue major newsbill fail at the Hull Daily Mail:

No strength to change...

Rugby League does like to shoot itself in the foot. Repeatedly. Only in this crazy, odd-shaped ball of a sport would a club help launch an anti-domestic violence campaign one day and announce, the following day, that they had signed a player that had pleaded guilty to a charge of domestic violence. The club is my beloved but increasingly bonkers Hull FC, the campaign - NHS Hull's Strength To Change - directly targets those who commit acts of violence towards women, the player is ex-Warrington Wolves full back Stuart Reardon, and he will be sentenced for an assault on his estranged wife Kay on April 23. Reardon needs to play somewhere, of course, but, given the high profile launch of the campaign, it shouldn't be in Hull. Yet Hull it is. The club deserves to take some serious flak for what is, at the very least, a serious PR blunder. No shortage of backs and the need to get some cover in asap can excuse this crazy move. "The timing of his arrival is ironic," pointed out Dave Hadfield in today's Independent. Not half.

Amongst the opposition...

One of the great pleasures of attending rugby league as a lad, aside from the game, was hearing grown men swear for 80 minutes. Now, as a grown man, I find myself listening to lads swearing for 80 minutes. Today I was a black and white amid a sea of dirty, dirty red and whites (I attended with a couple of Robins and, when I suggested that we "go up near your lot" didn't expect to find that their lot would outnumber our lot to such an extent. Silly me). A few seats up, two eight year olds were quite vocal. A shout of "Run at Calderwood. He's shit!" coming out of one mouth was quickly followed by a "Sit down you black and white bastards!" aimed at the East Stand opposite (I had very little to stand for throughout). Quite shocking, it were, out of the mouth of bairns and all that. Hull FC left it too late (ie the last 20 minutes) to turn up for the game and, thus, lost 14-18. In retrospect, and my sulking aside, it was quite a good, hard fought game.

Lucky sods...

Friday 13th? Eurgh. Went to see first game in Hull FC's Super League XIV campaign tonight, a tough contest against Wigan. Hull were, I thought, outstanding and, despite the ref's attempts to ruin the game, it was a superb, ding-dong, 80 minutes, with the auld black and whites running out 18-12 winners. Top four finish is on the cards, surely, he said, perhaps a little too early in the season to be taken seriously. But remember where you read it first. It was blinking cold - a good excuse to buy a new, retro, Hull FC hat from the club shop (I also, very stupidly, left my gloves at home, despite laying them out in readiness several hours before kick-off) and we made the KC's playing surface look like a rugby pitch, rather than that poncy bowling green the Tigers like to play their Premier League footie on.

28-16...

Not quite the dream ending we envisaged. But for about five minutes in the second half, it looked like the Wembley hoo-doo was going to be laid to rest. I turned to Sam at half-time, when the score was 10-0 to Saints, and told him he would be watching a miracle comeback in the second half. And it happened. But then it slipped away. Ah well. We'll have to wait a while longer.

Wembleybound...

Fingers crossed. You never know. Nothing's impossible, anything's possible.

Boom, boom...

Hull FC lost to Bradford. The 14-42 scoreline doesn't exactly suggest that they're running into a rich vein of form in time for the Challenge Cup.

We went to a party last night. Roy North, the former mid-1970s sidekick of foxy kid's favourite Basil Brush, was also in attendance. When he walked in, I said, oh, look, there's Roy Castle. Which would have been a miracle, of course (and been accompanied by a big flurry on a trumpet).

Tickets please...

The Wembley tickets are now in my possession, although I'm not too enamoured by the RFL's indiscreet envelope stuffing. Now, I'm not suggesting for one minute that the postie would have been tempted but it's pretty obvious that this envelope contains tickets for the Carnegie Challenge Cup. Silly RFL.

Tix...

Tickets for big match at Wembley are secured. Just the logistics to sort out now! And overcoming Saints, of course. But stranger things have happened in the weird and wonderful game of rugby league.

Cause for celebration...

Daughter was 18 today, so we celebratated that. Then, Hull FC beat Wakefield to get to the final of the Challenge Cup final. Yay! The final takes place on eldest son's birthday, so, if the birthday coincidence continues, maybe this is the year that the Wembley hoo doo will finally end for the black and whites.

West is best...

A great victory over the auld adversary ahead of next week's Challenge Cup semi-final. After an old skool evenly-matched opening, Rovers pretty much imploded in the second half and the black and whites went for the jugular.

Thanks, Dave Topliss, for playing a blinder...

There's a point in Sully when the legendary Clive Sullivan wins his Challenge Cup winner's medal with Hull FC and he utters the words, "Thanks, Dave Topliss, for playing a blinder" in recognition of man-of-the-match Toppo's efforts in securing the silverware against Leeds in the 1982 replay. Well, the legendary Dave Topliss died yesterday, following a heart attack during a game of five-a-side football. He was 58. Thanks for the great times down the Boulevard and elsewhere, Toppo.

Draw...

Mmm, Wakefield in the Challenge Cup semi-final. A good draw (the alternatives were locking horns with Leeds or St Helens). Apologies to those that don't live on the M62 corridor. Tomorrow I shall post pics of my flat cap and whippets.

Advances...

A second trip to Wembley is on the cards - Hull FC's defence outstanding in the 16-22 victory over the Bradford Bulls in the Challenge Cup and propelling them into the semi-finals. There was someone on crazy, whacky commercial station KCFM this morning suggesting that Hull City's promotion to the Premier League will result in dramatic reductions in crime, raised educational standards and a city full of aspirational youngsters that spurn drink, drugs and twocing in favour of working hard and earning so much money that the whole of Hull can be rebuilt out of gold within a week. So, cripes, if FC manage to get their hands on the Challenge Cup again surely the entire universe will have no choice but to start to revolve around us?

Defeated...

Hull FC's early season misery was compounded today when they lost a miserable encounter by one point and a drop goal in the dying seconds in a 10-11 defeat to the auld red and white rivals from across the city, who took the bragging rights and, thus, have given their jolly band of fans cause to whitter on for the next six weeks about how 'superior' they are. Oh dear oh dear. Neither team looks the greatest of Super League shakes right now.

Old faithful...

No Grand Final this year, then. Ah well.

Post game blues addendum:

Peter Cook' s Alan Latchley, if he'd been a rugby man (rather than a Scunny man) would have said that rugby's a cruel mistress. She's a… she's a… she can make you laugh, she can make you cry. She can bring tears to me eyes. She can bring blood to me shoulders. She can bring a kettle to the boil. Oh, hell, Hull FC, battered and bruised and concussed, gave it one hell of a shot but just couldn't halt Wigan's inevitable, seemingly fatalistic, journey onwards. There were a lot of if onlys, and it was a funny old season. And it's all over for another year. A few months to lick the wounds and then, woosh, that sinking feeling will be forgotten and we'll be off again.

Tags: Hull FC, rugby league

Happy birthday Sam...

Happy birthday to Sam. 12 today. And a big mound of cash to show for it, much of which will be heading the way of Matt Groening if Sam's usual shopping habits are any marker of such things.

And well done Hull FC who, after a scrappy victory over Huddersfield, now advance to a contest with an alarmingly running-into-form Wigan. Busy day at the KC next Saturday, with a Hull City game taking place at 12:30pm and then a quick sweep under the seats before us much nicer rugby lot move for the 7pm kick-off. Not a good day for anyone working behind the bars there, I shouldn't think.

Tags: birthday, Hull FC, KC Stadium, rugby league

Shameless self promotion # 1,078...

My latest 'official' blog is now online at the Hull Truck website here.

Tags: Hull FC. writing, Hull Truck, On A Shout

Belting...

Ooh, Hell's Kitchen - Barry and Adele in the final. I want Barry to win but expect that Adele will carry off the...erm...what exactly do they win? Barry will be hoping it's a big belt, I should think, and maybe Adele could do with a new belt too. So, that's decided, it's a belt. I shall let Marco know asap.

In other news, the recent Killing Time podcast that nobody's bothering to listen to is now listed amongst some proper ones on iTunes, and you can check out the glamorous listing here.

And Hull FC, top four finish. Well done. Maybe it's just me but I think that they're peaking at exactly the right time. Huddersfield at home now on Friday as the march to the Grand Final commences.

Grim up north...

Shall we not mention my Hull FC prediction? Well, go on then. Woefully off the mark. Given that we came nowhere close to the Robins on the pitch maybe it'd be better to campaig for Rovers to suffer a points deduction now Paul Cooke's been charged with "making an alleged illegal approach to another club prior to the expiry of his contact, without permission of his registered club."
Bit of a meeting re short films today, all the way up the road from the Grand at Leeds' strong-beer stronghold North. And talking of short film, you better go and see this.