THE SPORT COUNT

Anyone following The Sport Count’s musings over the past weeks might have formed the opinion that we think only a single sex plays basketball. This is simply untrue. While we acknowledge a, ahem, large bias towards news from the male game, we’d also like to point out that no bigger fans of Australia’s World Champion Opals exist anywhere.

We love them, and have spent the last few days feverishly cheering as they beat down inferior opposition in the hunt for Olympic gold.

Let this not be mistaken for tokenistic, condescending male support. The Count’s preferred style of basketball includes endless dunks, brutal swagger, broken ankles and fall-away jumpers, which the women’s game doesn’t provide in the same way as the NBA can. The moment it does, The Count’s collective dream of Lauren Jackson draining shots in the face of a cocky D-Wade will be one step closer.

No, our love for the Opals is genuine, and is based on one of The Sport Count’s Basic Principles: we love The Best. This is why we like Kobe, but not Doleac; why we like Beasley, and not Gallinari; and why we cannot, for the life of us, understand how Isiah Thomas was ever allowed to even stand near Madison Square Garden.

And being fans of pure excellence, The Count is tonight looking forward to our World Champion Opals thoroughly embarrassing the representatives of the host nation. Even with star forward Penny Taylor likely to be out injured, and Captain Jackson battling through chronic ankle pain that requires constant injections, our girls should put the Chinese away like a cheap set of tupperware. And then it’s onto you, America, where you get paid back for what you did to our boys.

Posted by: Alex