I don’t usually post one day after another but this is such a huge issue this is a properly irate rant rather than just an ill-informed one. The Rugby World Cup Organisers have put a blanket ban on musical instruments being taken into the Rugby Stadiums in New Zealand. Anyone with half a brain can see this is aimed at the vuvuzela which ruined the Soccer world cup for many with the horrendous racket made by the thousands of fans blowing on the bloody things day and night. However, this is not Soccer and this is not South Africa. I am not in New Zealand but I am going to go out on a limb and guess that there are very few vuvuzela’s about.

However, this ridiculously small-minded and badly thought out piece of planning has meant that the Scots are unable to take their pipes into the Stadiums either. Now one might think, “So what”? I’ll tell you so what. No one else wants to take a musical instrument into a stadium except that South African bloke with his trumpet who blows it from time to time in a Mexican fashion during the Springbok games, to which the crowd respond “Ole'”. Quite what this has to do with South African Rugby I have yet to fathom but they seem to like it and no-one else minds.

We are made to endure the efforts of a local brass band at the footy as well. Why? No-one outside the coal mining communities of the North of England and the Royal Marines likes a brass band so why do you inflict the bloody things upon us at the Rugby, please by all means ban them, immediately. There you have the sum total of the musical instruments people take to Rugby matches, except the Scots and their pipes. This is part of their culture and history. I have never met anyone, ever, who objected to the skirl of the bagpipe at a Scottish international Rugby match. How many are you expecting to arrive to justify a ban? The massed pipes and drums of the Bute and Argyll Highlanders? This outrageous ban is silencing the one thing they bring to the match to fizz up their boys on the pitch. The Scots national Anthem is a dreary dirge called the Flower of Scotland. While a pleasant enough tune it is more suitable to a funeral than a game of Rugby. So when it comes down to business they fire up the pipes. This is the sound that the hundreds of thousands of brave men of Scotland went to war to over the centuries. It is part of the fabric of their Nation. Take that away and you poison their souls.

By comparison to hurt the pride of a team you must also do the following if there is to be any sort of parity or nod to fairness in the voice and sound of the supporters of the National Teams. You must ban any members of the crowd doing an impromptu Haka. The Aussies singing Waltzing Mathilda have to be silenced. Stop the English singing their bizarre slavery inspired song? Try telling the Welsh there will be no singing of ‘Bread of Heaven’ or ‘Delilah’ I dare anyone to say to the Irish that if you strike up ‘the fields of Athenry’ you will be ejected from the match forthwith.  By extension the Waikato supporters must hand in their cowbells surely? At the Soccer World Cup a small band of English supporters take in a large drum and a couple of trumpets, it is part of the soundtrack of England playing in, and being knocked out of, major tournaments, no-one minds it. If the ridiculous organisers try and say “but those aren’t instruments”, technically true but it is the same thing in terms of how these people motivate themselves, The Scots aren’t really singers at the footy, they rely on the pipes. We love the pipes. They stir the soul of the supporters and players alike. The pipes are a huge part of New Zealand’s history as well, every single town in NZ has a pipe band.

Someone started this. One bloke or woman put forward this suggestion to a committee of fools. Stand up and own up. Hang your head and apologise and tell us you will never organise anything important again. I would wager a small bet you are also the idiot responsible for the carnage at the viaduct basin. Root this person out and reassign them to tea making. This ridiculous hateful ban must be overturned immediately. By all means ban the vuvuzela, round-up all 8 of them in New Zealand and burn them. Please distribute this far and wide. Lobby everyone who has a brain.  This nonsense needs to be stopped.