sob.....excuse this....sob...excuse for a...weep...blog.....

Above: Todays game made me cry more than the last time i watched this and that was a lot

We could talk about Referees decisions, a red card when it should be yellow, hitting the word work, not once but twice and playing for an hour with 14 men but in the end it came down to not scoring when we should, not taking the right decision when we had the chance and France taking all chances at points on getting them on the board. In the end, the record books will show that Wales lost in a semi final against France in 2011 by 8 points to 9. There will be no mention of the positive fever that gripped a nation for weeks, bolstering its supporters with hope and togetherness, no mention of a world cup turned on its head by a rugby nation of 3 million fervent souls, wishing, preying and populating every spare pub, rugby club, sofa and roofed national stadium in the country and above all it will not mention a team on the other side of the world that played heads up attacking thrilling rugby coupled with heart bursting defence and belief that gave its all and more for the world of rugby. They showed pride, a dark, deep down in the pits of the stomach pride in the jersey they wore and the country and its people who they represented and did it every time they took to the pitch.

Over the top, yes I am but I, like many of us, have invested so much time, money and heart into following Welsh rugby teams and sometimes that investment has delivered little in return. Yes there were good times, some rip roaring but a lot of the time we lost because in the end because we weren’t up to it, many times it was because we made silly mistakes and other times it was a mismatch in talent, fitness and heart from the beginning – all hurt, if like me you cared that much, then it brought tears and that hurt was a hurt in the core of your very being but while I have that feeling now, its there with a bit of sobbing anger at the way we have been knocked out, that if we had been beaten in a game of 80 minutes, 15 men against 15 men and France would have won by beating us then I could have just cried, looked inside myself and known that its rugby and that sometimes that’s just the way it goes. No, as I have just said my body aches and shakes with bitterness about the story board of this defeat and so will the players and especially so young Sam Warburton. A player who everybody talked about, not just for being a warm, sensible, inspiring, mature Captain or for looking a bit like Christopher eccleston but for being a number 7 so good that Kiwis stopped talking about their number 7 for a bit to focus on this 23 year old – a player recognised even by opposition players and supporters as a hard working clean player who has been judged harshly in the biggest game of his life. I just hope he knows that the history books will remember a sending off while the people that care, the people of Wales and the world rugby fraternity will remember him not only for his time, leadership and talent at this world cup but for seasons and seasons to come.

This team have played with verve and passion and took us along on a special journey, they deserve the plaudits but also deserved to go further. I hope they know how proud we are of them and at this moment, while tearful, shaken and pouting like a twat I feel in some way that all that investment has been worth it.