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The thrilling game

24th February 2008 by Helena 5 Comments  

Jonny

Some of you may think this blog is just an excuse to get yet another picture of Jonny Wilkinson up. And your problem with that is…?

Last night he proved yet again that he is the greatest living Englishman. The Six Nations match between England and France was as good as it gets. Normally only Grey’s Anatomy can make me forget I am ironing sheets. Last night I could have ironed every duvet cover in the house.

It rather reminded me of the old days with Rob Andrew, Jeremy Guscott and Will Carling. I was at Durham with Carling and he is the reason I started watching rugby in the first place. I remember the excitement when he was picked for England and then became England captain. Back then of course the game was amateur and he had to combine his rugby with his studies and army career.

Football is known as the beautiful game. I think rugby can be extremely beautiful too, especially when the French play their French flair. But last night there was (thankfully) not too much French flair. “More pain-au-chocolat than panache,” said my husband.

But we saw plently of English grit and of course Jonny’s flair. It is hard to define what made the game so exciting but part of it must be that it is a sport where everyone gives their all, that is fiercely masculine and also challenging. On the rare ocassions a try is scored, it really is an event.

So I fell asleep happy; Swing Low Sweet Chariot ringing in my ears. But all the way through the match I was convinced France would win. Which just goes to show that live sport is one of the few unpredictable things left in our sanitised and ordered world. And thankfully Jonny remains predictably brilliant.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2008


Filed Under: France, Jonny Wilkinson, Sport, blog --> Tagged With: thrilling

5 thoughts on The thrilling game

  • Sev says:
    24th February 2008 at 10:38 am

    I watched it too. What a great game. At halftime I thought I might go and join the French in the bar just around the corner from me. I was surprised to find that there were only about 3 people in there! Maybe they had already guessed what the final result would be…..
    It was a brilliant result for England, because there’s no doubt that the French team is excellent – and we beat them.

  • jules ritter says:
    24th February 2008 at 4:56 pm

    Dearest H, As lovely and poetic your prose maybe, the reality is you get turned on looking at a bunch of very fit, some gorgeously so – it’s that shoulder to waist ratio – enthusiatic men rolling together on the ground getting dirty. I know I am with you too. Our Jonny wasn’t really looking his best with those fat, red injured lips rather comically making him look like he was in drag – I had to will into my mind that naked Jonny picture I found on the gay site that we both drooled over.
    PS No I do not give my permission to print the above in The Times or The Telegraph in case you were doing another I love Jonny article. Julesritter.com

  • Graham says:
    24th February 2008 at 9:08 pm

    Calm down, calm down my dears..
    I love rugby, as I do football, ice hockey, golf, tennis, boxing and athletics. And you’ve reduced this sport of gladiators to sexual fantasies of men with bulging thighs and shorts rolling around in the mud. Well, nothing wrong with that I suppose, but it’s not cricket is it?
    Whatever happened to tactics, strategy, composure in a hostile environment? Where is the mention of fluidity, passing, running, tackles, driving force and territorial supremacy?
    One pretty boy does not make a rugby team. You need fourteen cauliflower eared oafs to win the position for him.
    I do understand your appreciation of the game as women, rather similar to that of the male (me), because I would never pay to watch women play a sport…. Except… er… topless mud wrestling.

  • helena says:
    25th February 2008 at 9:39 am

    Morning Graham
    I do have to defend myself here. I admit that Jonny has something special but there are many other reasons I watch the game. One of them being France’s new prop who has to be the only handsome prop ever. Vive la France I say. Although I hear he is Polish.
    Hx

  • jules ritter says:
    25th February 2008 at 2:38 pm

    Was he that wet behind the ears 19 year old? You Perv Helena! jules

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi-based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor-in-chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She is working on a thriller set in Sweden as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

In 2022 her short story The Japanese Gardener came second in the Fish Publishing Short Story Prize. One of her stories was also shortlisted for the Bridport Short Story Prize. When she’s not writing, she works as a headhunter for the media and entertainment industry for the Sucherman Group. 

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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