Cardiff City Victory & Welsh Invasion to Retake Llundain

Feb 25th and 26th: A Welsh invasion is on the cards

Being a Cardiff fan I am so used to losing, it has surely  been a source of time-off Purgatory for time-served?

Have times changed? Judging from yesterday they may well have. What can I say about last night's Carling Cup semi-final football? Very, very exciting.

When Miller missed the first penalty for Cardiff my pessimistic thoughts were "oh no... here we go again." After hitting the woodwork three times in total... it looked bad.

Yet thanks to some superb penalty saves from City's keeper Heaton, Cardiff are through to the final.

The match was so exciting, I was glued all evening. It may even have finished some of the more elderly members of the extended Hurley family. We may have to do a head count of all my uncles.

This morning I made my way into the kitchen to put some bread in the toaster with a wide smile on my face and a spring in my step. On informing the youngest about the glory that is Cardiff City (last time I checked, to my horror, she supported Liverpool), I was told that they had seen the goals already on the morning news.

Then Mrs H chipped in with "see, why did you watch it last night? We've seen all the goals this morning."

I was gobsmacked. Whatever else? Celebrate Christmas on Boxing Day? Or Good Friday on Low Sunday? St David's Day in April? Watch the Six Nations in the Summer?

Needless to say I did some brisk tut tutting as I buttered my toast, and in polite, refined society (which I have shoehorned myself into despite the protests) that is quite a rebuttal let me tell you!

Could it be more exciting? Yes! Cardiff will be in Wembley on the 26th Feb. The day before (yes, that's the 25th, thank you professor) Wales play England at Twickenham. Ohhhh... can Y Cymry reclaim Llundain for the weekend? Two victories would be fantastic, and so much more cultured than the behaviour of Queen Boudicca of the Celtic Iceni tribe when she last visited London.

So come on Welsh rugby players and Cardiff football players! Let's go for the double whammy. 

Some people think sports is boring or over-emphasised. I would certainly agree that too many sportsmen (especially footballers) are primadonnas, cheats and are well overpaid, but that aside (and I am not averse to returning sports to the grass roots in some way), as the old saying, attributed to Winston Churchill, goes:

To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.

Or in this case, kicking a ball is better than shooting a gun. And I would far rather, as a patriot, see Wales assert herself on the sports field than on the battlefield, win or lose.

So yes, sport is just sport, but for those of us who see our love of hometown and love of country played out on the pitches of Wales and England, what a great way to celebrate what we are and where we are from - which doesn't harm our neighbours or anyone else.

So in closing and before I forget, a Happy St Dwynwen's Day to one and all and especially Mrs H.

Love is in the air! After being a 'football widow' last night she has my undivided attention tonight... maybe there's a shelf she wants me to put up? ;-) I will make her a nice cup of Glengettie. Who said I know nothing about romance?

And here, for Old Ma Hurley, is friend-of-the-family Charlotte Church singing Men of Harlech just to get everyone in the mood for Wales and Cardiff winning:





And here, for Old Pa Hurley, is his old friend, a pint of Brains. Just to get him in a patriotic mood! I did tweet a Brains employee to ask if he could get some recognition for all the hard (and patriotic) work he's done over the years. She wrote back that a specially struck medal might be the order of the day... Well, you never know.

And for my in-laws north of the border, in the Norse Orcadian lands and their vicinity, a very happy Burns Night (even though I read somewhere he was a wee bit dodgy, a Freemason no less). Yes, we can all say "Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie" in our best mock-jock accents tonight!