What's in an anthem?

Chaps,

I note with interest the furore in our farthest flung colony over the reluctance of the All Black chappies to sing God Defend New Zealand before matches.  This article rather grabbed my attention:

When I was a kid, it was all much simpler. The Army band showed off in front of the Eden Park main stand for a while, sometimes venturing across to the terraces for the ritual pelting with grapefruit - a strange Auckland practice that died with the old concrete terraces.

Then the teams ran on, the band blasted out a verse of God Save the Queen, and it was on with the game. Those were the days when the rugby playing world was all part of one empire, and we needed only one anthem.

What delightful memories!  Enough to bring a tear to a chap's eye if he wasn't possessed of such a stiff upper lip.  But I ask you: why does New Zealand need this silly song of theirs when God Save The Queen is perfectly adequate?  One doesn't drive a Rover when one owns an Aston Martin, so why should NZ jettison the greatest anthem of all for a pale colonial imitation of it?  There should be no shame in singing for the Queen.  It is only hippies and homosexuals who are embarrassed by such matters.

I urge the NZRU to restore the traditional anthem so that Richie McCaw and Dan Carter can once again sing along with pride.  We know that both those chaps will soon be following Sean Fitzpatrick to the Mother Country to become English squires, so best if they are permitted to get a bit of practice in beforehand. 

Yours, etc
Viscount Crouchback

Comments

[Kaksioek]

Squire,

I read with great amusement your withering attack on Mark Keohane and was quite surprised to see that you had deleted it.

I refer of course to the entry titled 'What a charmless bunch'.

Did the nauseating little man implore you to spare him such public embarrassment or did you alone decide you had overstepped the mark?

Yours enquiringly,
Kaksioek

[Viscount Crouchback]

Well, old top, I received a strongly worded communication from an intemperate firm of solicitors and decided that discretion was the better part of valour.

In any case, the ghastly mob at Keo.co.za hardly deserve a mention on a glorious blog like this.

[Kaksioek]

How ghastly - but just what you'd expect from the man who put the 'petite' into 'petite bourgeoisie'.

[Viscount Crouchback]

Indeed. Keohane ought to invest in a "Sarkozy Special" foot stool.

Cardinelli looks to be the only remotely shaggable chap at Keo, and he's completely bonkers.

The less said about Ryan "Maori" Vrede, the better.

[Kaksioek]

I see they have replaced the rather large and startling single photo on the 'HSM writers clean up' (and not before time, it must be said) post with three much smaller ones. It's a step in the right direction at least.

[Kaksioek]

Of course the awards themselves suggest that the last literate person - no doubt some stubborn holdout in the last outpost - has finally left South Africa.