Not long ago, a "Premium Lager" was at least 5% ABV, sometimes more. Now, as the Corporate beancounters in the Mega Brewing Corporations try to squeeze more & more profit out of their feifs, this is no longer the case.
I was suprised to find out that Stella Artois or "Wifebeater" as it has been called is now down to 4.6%. What is now called 1664 Biere - they seem to have dropped the Kronenbourg - is likewise diminished. Even my old fave, Grolsch, is now cut to 4%
Also, more & more Lagers are brewed in the UK under license
From Google AI:-
Actually, the vast majority of popular "continental" lagers sold in the UK are not brewed in their countries of origin. Instead, roughly 85% to 90% of these foreign-branded mainstream lagers are brewed right here in the UK under license by major multinational conglomerates to cut transport costs and avoid high import duties.
Bastards!
There are some notable exceptions though:-
Conversely, true imports that are still brewed abroad and shipped into the UK include select batches of Pilsner Urquell, Budweiser Budvar, and bottled variants of Estrella Dam
I started putting together a spreadsheet of this, (yes, I know), then had the bright idea of gettig AI to do it for me. What took me an hour, took AI 5 seconds....
and one of Wales’s most successful entrepreneurs, has called for the entire board of the Welsh Rugby Union to resign, accusing its leadership of “complete madness” and “total insanity."
I haven't been asked yet, but perhaps they have been ringing my moribund landline....
If you don't have time to watch the full 30 mins, Here's an AI summary of the main points:-
“How the Welsh Rugby Union destroyed its own National Team | A Squidge Rugby Deep Dive” by Squidge Rugby, published 13 April 2026. The central argument is that Wales’ collapse from being world No. 1 in 2019 to an 18-match losing streak was primarily a systemic failure of Welsh rugby administration and investment, rather than simply a failure of coaches or players.
The main points
Wales didn't suddenly become bad at rugby
Squidge starts from the dramatic contrast: Wales were ranked No. 1 in the world in August 2019, yet just a few years later they had suffered an unprecedented run of defeats.
His argument is that the talent didn't disappear overnight. The environment around the players deteriorated.
The WRU repeatedly made short-term financial decisions
A major theme is austerity and cost-cutting.
Instead of treating the professional game as the engine that produces the national team, the WRU increasingly tried to reduce expenditure.
This particularly affected the Welsh regions, which are crucial for developing and retaining international-quality players.
The regional system was allowed to deteriorate
Squidge argues that Wales has never properly solved the fundamental question of how its four professional regions should work.
There have repeatedly been proposals to reduce the number of regions or restructure them, creating years of uncertainty.
Earlier proposals to cut a region were already controversial because Wales would have had a substantially smaller professional player pool than comparable nations such as Ireland and New Zealand.
The WRU's governance is a huge part of the problem
The video is particularly critical of leadership, governance and institutional culture.
Decisions were often made by people with competing interests, while accountability was weak.
This is consistent with criticism from within Welsh rugby that governance problems and poor leadership allowed problems to become entrenched.
The national team was effectively being asked to compensate for problems underneath it
Coaches and players became the visible targets when results went badly.
But Squidge's point is that changing the head coach doesn't fix a broken pathway.
If there aren't enough well-funded professional teams, good coaching environments, competitive matches and opportunities for young players, the national team eventually suffers.
Wales fell behind other nations financially
One particularly important comparison is with Ireland and Scotland.
Wales' professional teams were operating with significantly less funding than their major competitors. At one point, Welsh professional funding was being reduced while Ireland was investing dramatically more in its professional system.
Squidge sees this as a false economy: saving money in the short term ultimately makes the national team less competitive and therefore damages the WRU's most valuable asset.
The WRU's relationship with supporters has deteriorated
This isn't just about wins and losses.
Welsh rugby has historically been deeply connected to Welsh identity and community. Sport has played an unusually important role in expressing Welsh national identity.
Squidge's broader argument is that the WRU has increasingly treated rugby as a financial/product-management problem rather than understanding the emotional and cultural reasons people care about it.
The 2019 success masked underlying problems
This is probably one of the video's most important ideas.
Wales reaching No. 1 and having sustained success under Warren Gatland created the impression that the underlying system was healthy.
In reality, some structural problems were already there.
Once the exceptional generation of players began to age or retire, those weaknesses became impossible to hide.
The overall argument
I'd boil Squidge's thesis down to:
Wales didn't lose its rugby ability; it lost the system that produced and sustained its rugby ability.
He sees the collapse as the result of years of underinvestment + poor governance + instability in the professional regions + short-term financial thinking + failure to develop a coherent long-term strategy.
And importantly, he isn't arguing that every decision was malicious or that every individual involved was incompetent. His argument is more that the WRU became an organisation incapable of making the long-term, coordinated decisions required to sustain a world-class national team.
What I think is the most important takeaway
The video is really less about Warren Gatland, individual players or one bad Six Nations campaign, and more about the pipeline:
Grassroots → academies → professional regions → player development → Wales
Squidge's contention is that the WRU weakened multiple links in that chain and then became surprised when the national team eventually collapsed.
That also explains why simply saying “get a better coach” isn't enough. A better coach can improve a team, but they can't manufacture dozens of high-quality professional players if the domestic system isn't producing them.
There is also a very current dimension to this: the debate over whether Wales should have two, three or four professional regions is still ongoing in 2026, with critics arguing that the WRU has focused too narrowly on the number of regions rather than asking what structure actually produces players and sustainable professional rugby.
Based on a rec by the clinging to the wreckage crew, we started watching this. It's one of those really sharply written American comedies produced recently.
The shining light for me is Harrison Ford, as a grumpy old shrink, with great lines like "I'm a cranky old bastard with a full head of hair" which of course appeals to me.
The rest of the cast are fab, with a full pc ethnicity quota. We are on series 2 ep 9, and either me or the writers are becoming tired. Kim doesn't feel this, so perhaps it's me. It also slips into schmaltz quite a lot. I'm also surprised at how much serious swearing and sex references have become more mainstream. Am I becoming more prudish in my "late middle age" - big flapping pussy/suck my ass/& various objects up the bum references.
Nah, belay that, it's just got good again :-)
All in all, one of the best recent US comedies - 8/10
The Hog was in for it's first annual service, and as Yamaha are still running their £10k prize draw promotion for test drives, I took a MT09SP out for a spin. As I got to the start of the lovely winding Black Mountain run, I noticed that the powers that be had decided to make the 5 miles of the run a 40mph Average Speed Camera Zone for my safety. Bless them. I was not a happy bunny.
However, I couldn't see any cameras, or a way of monitoring my run. When I got to the Cafe, I googled this, and found out that:-
Naughty Vandals! I thought they were defeated and erased by the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire during the Vandalic War of 533–534 CE. Emperor Justinian I sent his general, Belisarius, who decisively beat the Vandal forces in North Africa. Looks likre the scamps have made a re-appearance in Brynamman.
However, I also noticed the clubhouse of the South West Chapter of the Hell's Angels is just down the road, in Gwaen-Cae-Gerwen. I wonder if this is a coincidence?
