Weddings, World Cups and family building
BY SAM BUCKLEI get married on Friday. And it clashes with the Phoenix’s match in Perth. Such are the sacrifices one makes.
One friend of mine, a Wellington football personality (to remain anonymous), actually emailed me to point out the venue doesn’t get Sky Sports 3 and suggest we take a laptop and a T3G card (to watch via the internet). Somehow, I deemed it wise not to forward this idea to Penny.
Since she’s probably going to discover I’ve found the time to write two blog posts within four days of our wedding, I thought it prudent to work Pen, the kids and our big day into one of them. Hopefully, it softens the discovery.
She does tolerate a ridiculous amount of football. Through autumn-winter I’m AWOL every Saturday from midday until six, plus at least one, often two nights a week at training. Come spring-summer we’ve got an endless flood of A-League and Premiership football to watch, the Phoenix at home every second weekend, Team Wellington, not to forget hours buried on my laptop each night writing blogs, checking results from the UK, to Denmark to the US or mindlessly wasting my life on football forums, most prolifically Yellow Fever.
In between times, I need to squeeze in a job, study (which, mercifully, I just submitted) and the small matter of a family of five. She is one helluva trouper to put up with all that and only very, very, very occasionally melt down in quite understandable frustration.
But there’s more. On May 23 our three kids (Isla 5, Lily 4, Ted 2) are due to be joined by a fourth bundle of joy and sleeplessness. On June 14 my flight departs for Johannesburg. Yes, somehow I’ve massaged a trip to the World Cup.
In theory (and assuming, fingers crossed, the baby arrives healthy and without hitch), that leaves a three-week window between the birth and the All Whites' opening World Cup match against Slovakia in Rustenburg. Given our history of late arrivals, a week to 10 days is far more likely. I was bloody relieved when the All Whites avoided Groups A,B and C - which would have really cut things fine.
Even when you've known somebody more than eight years, have three kids and a mortgage, it requires some cheek, even gall (and yes Pen, there were a couple of false starts) to seriously put forward the preposterous notion that you disappear to a nice, friendly place like Johannesburg to watch some football during the 3rd and 4th weeks of the life of your fourth child. It was actually Coen Lammers' article, You'll Kick Yourself if You Miss Football's World Cup, that broke the ice. I seriously owe Coen a beer, and willl buy him a pint in South Africa if I bump into him. I'm told he's a football nutter, which is a good enough reason anyway.
So, as soon as I sensed even the slightest hint of a green light, the deposit was paid, lightning fast. Even still I thought it also strategic to publicise this green light, thereby (by my calculation at least) making it more awkward for Pen to reverse her earlier permission (imagine the public backlash against such a dastardly reversal).
I suspect there will be family advocacy groups somewhat doubtful about the merits of this sojourn on my part. I just hope they understand this is the kind of give and take, the kind of constructive family building experience, upon which enduring relationships and families are built. Next time the All Whites qualify, it's Penny’s turn to go - of course.
Thanks Pen, you’re a star.
And I’m prepared to watch the Phoenix vs Perth on replay … this once.
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Maybe be can have the internet hooked up to a big screen above the dance floor? I'm pretty sure that no family would tolerate the amount of time I spend on football. The question is - if you are watching football do you miss more of the game if you are boozing, chanting and dancing, or if you have two or three kids with you?
Penny is a saint. That is all.
Good work Sam, and best wishes for Saturday.
I also believe I have the best wife in the world for the amount of football she has tolerated me abandoning her for over the past 10 years. Like you I get up in the middle of the night to watch live Premier League football and then zombie around the house for the rest of the day (often morbidly depressed lately as a Liverpool fan!)being hopeless with the two little ones.
Like you, I managed to negotiate leaving a very young child behind in England to go to the relative safety of Istanbul in 2005.
But one thing I can say, is that as football fans marrooned in New Zealand, this trip to South Africa is a "no-brainer". It's an opportunity we can't afford to miss, as watching it on telly is never as good as being there proper, and though this is my third world cup, it is the one I feel as if I properly belong in.
See you on that plane to Joburg on the 14th!!!
Postpone the wedding and watch the Perth game.
You know that's the right thing to do.
Billy, just realised my flight leaves on 13th! (just as well).
It'll be huge ... the wedding that is
Sam
I will have my laptop, and T3 card, just in case there's a lull in proceedings...either way we'll have to arrange some hand signals for that quick glance between vows...
Or, for completeness' sake, if there aren't lulls in proceedings, the Footy Mate application for the iPhone is very discreet...
Nice Piece Sam, All the best this weekend pal..hope the sun is shining.
I wouldn't worry about dates and times of flights to SA now Sam. More important you know when and where for Saturday (the wedding, not the Phoenix!!).
Instead of the plane, I'll see you in Rustenburg, Nelspruit and Polokwane!!!!
You're not alone Sam.
I remember when I got to Frankfurt for the Socceroos in 2006 there was a bloke there whose wife had given birth A WEEK before the Australia vs Japan game and he was given 'dispensation' by the Missus to go to Germany.
Not an unheard of story mentioned by Sam.
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Top post, Sam.
All the best to you and Pen for the wedding. I would make some salacious comment regarding the ante - wedding activities however given the fourth wee bairn is on its way, perhaps the replay might be the best option.