Inside the weird wide world of modern sports fixtures

Boks vs Japan at Wembley in London, Memphis vs Orlando in Berlin, AC Milan vs Como in Perth... What on earth is going on?

- By Mike Wills

These are the lyrics of Jamaican Prince Buster's ska hit that inspired the name for the 1980s chart-topping band Madness.

Much as I would like this frothy old man's rant to be about the entrails of Caribbean musical influence on British pop, it isn't. It's about the madness gripping modern sport. Somehow, the memo that globalisation is out of economic and political fashion because of the carnage it inflicts on local employment and communities has not reached the sporting powers-that-be.

Let's start this diatribe with the Springboks drubbing Japan last Saturday before a paltry crowd at a wet Wembley in London. Why did that meandering game take place in an arena so alien to the sport, at least 9,000km from either team's home ground?

Especially because we are constantly told there is too much rugby, I assume it was an attempt to gouge sterling out of London Saffers who declined, having spent a fortune just four weeks ago to see Argentina throw away home advantage in a key Rugby Championship fixture by playing the Boks at Twickenham.

And the Wembley game was played at the same time as England met the Wallabies just 15km across London at the home of rugby.

Meanwhile, Ireland were playing a theoretically tasty fixture against the All Blacks, but they decided to stage it (and lose it) way across the pond at Soldier Field, the home of the Chicago Bears football team. What could have been a cracking Dublin occasion became an inconsequential US popcorn event.