kenny weir

Three hours to go. Arghhhhhhh! As I said above, Guus will have factored in a 1-0 away loss right from the get go. Sure a 2-1 loss or 1-1 draw woulda been better, but Uruguay is one of the toughest away games anywhere. Like Uruguay, his selection for the away game was restricted by a number of Australian players sitting on yellow cards. No such problem tonight, so Tim Cahill will get a run. He's been doing pretty good for Everton. Likewise, you can be sure he will have already thought out a penalty shoot-out tactic, should Australia get a 1-0 win in a few hours. BTW, I don't begrudge the soccer might of South America four or even five automatic places. The unfairness comes with Australia having arun-up that involves only sporadic and few games against the likes of NZ, the Solomons and Jamaica. And then playing the fifth-placed South American side, Uruguay for two cups in a row, which has been playing a long series of incredibly hard games against the likes of Argentina and Brazil just to play us.

I'd like to get some of these. Can anyone point in the direction of a preferred outlet?

Marcus - Thanks for that. We need all the help we can get. Yes, there was a certain boorishness last time around. And then, this time, they changed the start time in Montevideo twice to suit their own ends. Even Ronaldo has come out and gone close to accusing them of being cheats. Recoba has raised the temperature a bit by claiming Uruguay has some sort of divine right to play at the World Cup that Australia doesn't. And maybe that's a reflection of insecurity. Thankfully, this is the last time we will have to go through this BS - next time we're in Asia. Which won't be easier, but will surely be fairer.

Sorry to be a bore, but shouldn't that be Uruguay? ← Yep - as per the rest of my post.

Australia lost 1-0 in Paraguay and the return leg is tonight. We desperately needed an away goal. A single score by Uruguay tonight and we're outta there. My vintage Socceroo pessimisim is kicking, a great wall of gloom, but ... As others have pointed out ... *Brazil and Argentina have never beaten Uruguay in Montevideo in a serious game either, so ourt result was actually pretty good (and heaps better than the 3-0 thrashing of four years ago). *Hiddinck will have assumed he would be going into the Sydney leg on the back of a 1-0 loss months ago. *Tonight, the Aussies will have an 83,000 crowd baying for glory! It's just that I can't see our guys scoring two goals AND keeping Uruguay out for 90 minutes. So it may down to a 1-0 win, extra time and penalties - and that'll do!

I haven't got my set yet, but I do have an 18-track sampler. After hearing about half of it with headphones, for my tastes the sound is WAY, WAY better than the Rounders. Maybe I'm prepared to happily accept a higher degree of compromise than Lon and others, but I can now envision playing much of this with unadulterated pleasure - and not through gritted tetth. For me, it sounds like the fog has lifted!

John, the whole deal changes for the next cup anyhow, from an Australian perspective. Australia will leave the Oceania group and compete as part of the Asian group. I doubt this will be much easier; the efforts of South Korea and Japan at the last cup were far and away the most thrilling and inspiring part of the tournament for me. But there will be numerous positives for us in the Asia move: * No longer facing the fifth-placed South American side. * Regular, tough international competition. Up until now, Australia's erratic cup campaigns have been marked by easy Oceanania games against the likes of NZ and Solomons, then haphazard friendlies, followed by the South American nightmare. * There will also be intra-club activity with Asian sides, which will hopefully push our new A-League - already off to a flying start (the crowds have been great!) - to a whole nutha level. * And, perhaps best of all, football may play a big part in creating better understanding and less mistrust and ill-will between Australia and its northern neighbours. In these days of bombs in Bali, this game just may do what politicians, conferences, talk fests, trade talks and disaster aid can never acheive.

Well as Australia gets its head around facing Uruguay again, a pretty decent effort is being made of looking on the bright side: Soc: Uruguay better outcome than Colombia: Arnold SoccerAust Colombia By Guy Hand MELBOURNE, Oct 13 AAP - The Socceroos have dodged the most lethal of the South American bullets which could have shot down their hopes of making their first WorldCup finals in more than 30 years, according to assistant coach Graham Arnold. Arnold believes Uruguay is an easier assignment than having to play Colombia, a strife-torn and drug-troubled nation offering a selection of venues among the world's most inhospitable for away teams. Options included the nation's capital Bogota and Medellin - the city where Colombian soccer player Andres Escobar was shot dead in 1994 after an own goal which led to the nation being knocked out of the World Cup finals. The Colombians play most of their home matches in the port city of Barranquilla - with heat and humidity Arnold believes would have severely hindered the Socceroos' hopes of World Cup qualification. ``This is a better option than having to go to Colombia,'' Arnold said after Uruguay beat Argentina 1-0 to claim fifth place in the South American group and book a playoff against the Socceroos next month. ``We would have preferred Chile, but we prefer Uruguayto Colombia definitely. ``Barranquilla has 40 degree heat and 100 percent humidity - the players wouldn't have been able to handle it. ``And most of Uruguay's players will have to come backfrom Europe through South America. ``Seventy-five percent of the Colombian team are based in Colombia so they would not have had to travel.'' Arnold also said revenge would be a powerful motivatorfor the Socceroos who had been part of the 2001 campaign which faltered in Montevideo. Australia lost 3-0 to Uruguay there and played poorly, looking overwhelmed by the occasion and the hostile atmosphere generated in the Estadio Centenario. ``The players are looking forward to it because they'd like revenge,'' Arnold said. ``It's better to go to the known than the unknown at times. ``This (Uruguay) is a known. The players are more ready than they were four years ago. ``Some of the guys who were 22 or 23 then are now 26or 27 and more mature.'' AAP

Yup, Chile or Colombia would have been better for us. Still in with a chance, though. Man after all this hectic fun at qualifying, waiting until June for the real stuff to begin will be a drag.

Well, I guess there'll be a lull after qualifyingn is over, but I'm still a little surprised how pumped I'm getting about all this. Last Sunday, the Socceroos thumped Jamaica 5-0 in a friendly in London. It was one those matches: Did we make them look lousy by being so good, or were they so lousy they made us look good? Y'now? Still, it was clear that new coach Gus Huddink is having a major impact, and everyone is now wishing he'd replaced Frank Farina a long time ago. Things still look scarily patchy in the defence department. Australia's South American opponent - Uruguay, Colombia or Chile - will be known later this morning. A big break came Australia's way when it won the right to host the home leg of the two games last, so they'll return from South America knowing exactly where they stand I'm veering between gloomy pessimism and the merest twinkle of optimism.

Your're 100% correct. It IS too much. Pobably the most preposterous reissue of any genre. Ever. I ordered it anyway.

OK, my bad. I love it here and realise I should just shut up about that other stuff. Ordered the CD anyway!

Well, I'm a former BNBBer, too. But I'm a slut - this is one of four jazz BBs I frequent. And say what you like about the others - good, bad or indifferent - their members virtually never feel the need to diss other places. Which I like. To be fair, that sort of crap NEVER comes from the members of Organissimo. Which means I'll go and order their new CD. Right now.

I think he's nuts, but - as I've posted elsewhere - much of the problem (as alluded to above) comes from thinking of New Orleans jazz scene. There's no such thing in reality. There's just a New Orleans music scene.

One wonders if this guys has actually spent any time in New Orleans in the past decade or so. Mentioning Connick and the Marsalis Bros (and nothing against them) as "good examples" would seem to indicate not.

Seventh level for me. Youse guys either aren't trying hard enough or you're lying. The obsession around here Mosaics in particular and boxed sets in general - and never mind The Bastards - would I think automatically qualify just about all board members for the hotter nether regions.

To see the LOC recordings as mainly of interest for Jelly's delicious and sometimes suspect reminiscing is a mistake. The piano playing and music side of those sessions if wonderful, with all his classic compositions featured, often in longer versions than found on earlier recordings, be they either solo band versions. For mine, I'll be keeping the earlier, music-only Rounder CDs for sure.

Try this: http://web1.nugs.net/attics/720827_mp3.asp...w=246&cmd=shows

Ahem ... Sugar Magnolia for sale: http://www.undercover.com.au/news/2005/sep...atefuldead.html

I'm now officially open to pre-EBay offers.

The Socceroos beat Solomon Islands 7-0, and must now play the fith-placed South American side home and away to get through to the cup. That's Uruguat at the moment - the side that put the Australians out last time around. Meanwhile, two rounds in, the brand new Aussie A-League has surely surprised even the boss honchos, with amazing crowds that rival (at the lower end sof the scale) those of rugby league and AFL (Aussie rules). The games I have seen on TV have been OK, if a little shaky defensively. But it's great the public is swinging behind these teams. I saw the US-Mexico game. Pretty oridinary, especially in the first half, but the two goals were pure class!

Visa Simple really.

Yep!

Australia lost all its matches at the Confederations Cup in Germany, after which coach Frank Farina was quickly replaced by Dutchman Guus Hiddink. Ditching Farina is a move that prolly should've happened a year earlier. The national squad has just been through a training camp in the Netherlands. To get to the cup, the Socceroos must beat the Solomon Islands - should be easy, but with the Soocceroos ya never know - and then the biggie: Home and away matches against the fifth-placed South American side. Colombia, I think it'll be. I remain both hopeful and pessimistic! Meanwhile, a new 8-team A-League kicks off next weekend in what is widely perceived as a last-ditch project for the game to get its act together in Australia. Soccer here has long been dragged down by the passionate but stupefyingly boring and pathetic clashes of rival ethnic sectors, with only the odd riot to liven things up. Ha ha. I enjoyed the hell out of the last cup - esecially the performances of South Korea and Japan. Incredible to think an Asian team made it ot the semis of the World Cup! My wish for Germany 2006: Buckets of upsets, with stellar showings by Asian/African side and - gasp! - one of them to make the final. Actually, in that regard, the US would do, too!

Yep. And it can get even murkier. Take the case of Fresh Sounds. Dodgy reissues but widely respected releases of new music, too. What do we do - boycott the reissues but buy the new stuff? Personally, I was getting quite a few Proper boxes for review a few years back and thought they were pretty cool, but I've gone off them in a big way. Not so much for the ethical reasons as because of quality. Recently I was happy to pay quite a bit extra to get the official, complete Milton Brown on Texas Rose, sound quality amazing on a release done in conjunction with Brown's brother. Proper has a Shorty Rogers box coming. Hmmmm ... Folkses can rant all they like - and in general I agree - but if the source label doesn't release stuff others will. I guarantee it. Simple if sad.