Search for ultimate insult

Beer frothed up out of the Foster’s tinny as the big hairy mitt of Kevin crashed it down on the railway sleeper-topped bar in Wollamagoduru Springs, that pustule on the bum of the Outback.

“I know!” he shouted, “I got it!”

There was a moment of silence as they all turned towards him.

“Your mother dances in hob-nailed boots on the kitchen table!”

He beamed with pride. There were grunts of approval around the bar. Bruce, the barman shouted: “OK! We’ll put that one down. Good on yer, mate!”

Mitchell (his name was originally John, but he changed it in honour of the Baggy Greens, cos cricket was his life, ya know?) waved his sun-tanned arm, causing a flurry of dust to leave his khaki shirt. “May your bum turn square and fester at the corners and may your fingers turn into fishhooks when you scratch it!”

The applause bounced off the corrugated iron walls. They were making progress, thought Bruce. They were doing their patriotic duty. When the call came from the Australian Cricket Union, they didn’t hesitate. The blazer-wearing cobbers in Sydney had asked all cricket lovers across the country to supply new sledging material, because David Warner and the lads in South Africa were struggling a bit …

You knew that was the case when Quinton De Kock got that cross that even he came up with something nasty to say to Dave-O. Bloody Boers didn’t realise that you cannot slag off a bloke’s Sheila.

That’s what that bloody cheeky Zimbabwean Eddo Brandes did to Glen McGrath one time. When “Nobby” asked Brandes why he was so fat, that useless Number 11 said: “Every time I shag your wife, she gives me a biscuit …”

The Wollamagoduru Springs Gentlemen’s Cricket Club had been so incensed about De Kock that they had a quick whip-around to pay for a ticket to send Mitchell and Kevin to South Africa, with a bit extra to buy a chicken to chuck at De Kock when he came off the field. That worked bloody well when they did it in 1997 to Pat Symcox in the Test at Sydney.

Then they remembered that the last time they sent a sabotage team out to SA – Jim and Jack it was – the last thing they heard from them was a telegram sent from PE: Beer better. STOP. Sheilas better. STOP. Not so many flies. STOP. Biltong. STOP. Proper wine. STOP. Braais not barbies. STOP. Won’t be back. STOP. Sorry STOP.

Then a voice piped up at the bar: “So what on earth do you say to the black fella?”

Heads shook. That Rabada bloke was certainly full of it too, but you had to be careful because he was clever. Some of the things he said on TV they had to get Bruce to Teacher to explain … and even then he struggled.

Besides, he got a “five-for” and against our boys, that’s pretty bloody good.

“Hey!” Hughie splashed his Fosters across the sawdust floor. Everybody looked at him.

“You bat like a Pom! There was a shocked silence.

Bruce said: “You’re banned! Get outta here! You can’t use an insult like that here. That’s nasty!”

Brendan Seery.

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