A few Kangaroo league coaches have lacked decorum when things haven't gone well. Ricky Stuart springs to mind, as does Wayne Bennett (although Stuart doesn't seem to react all that well to anything). But at the 1995 World Cup in England, the immortal Fulton was unhappy with the refereeing and accused the game of orchestrating a "carve up"... after Australia beat the Kiwis in a semifinal. New Zealand has never bagged a referee after winning. Never.
4) The underarm incident
This peak in low behaviour from 1981 needs no introduction. A couple of Chappells conspired to put cricket in the gutter, using the rules of the time to roll instead of bowl the final ball of a one day game so Brian McKechnie couldn't hit it for six. Captain Greg's lack of faith in bowler Trevor will never be forgotten. What kind of way is that to treat your kid brother? Poor Trev has ended up in the Hall of Infamy through no real fault of his own. Would a New Zealander ever ask a team-mate to bowl badly? Perish the thought.
5) Offside
Still smarting from New Zealand's triumphant march into the Fifa 1982 World Cup finals, Australia packed up its tent and quit Oceania for the Asian zone 10 years ago. Australia is many things, but it is not in Asia. Come on Aussie - get over it. Take a leaf out of our book and treat your smaller Oceania football neighbours with more respect.
6) Stole the 2003 Rugby World Cup
The spirit of transtasman brother and sisterhood was smashed forever when the Ockers stole the tournament by blading co-hosts New Zealand. Then they intercepted a perfectly good pass by Carlos Spencer in the semifinal. Have they no shame? New Zealand leads the rugby world in respecting smaller neighbours. Hell, we even played a test in Samoa this year. Look and learn, Aussie.
7) Tennis players
Tennis isn't a sport we normally like to bring up for obvious reasons, but on this occasion it is well worth a mention. We'll keep it brief and boil this down to two words - Nick and Kyrgios. No point in banging on about it though. Our tennis players never make any noise.
8) Defiling cricket
Cricket is such a clean game, and then along came Steve Smith. He allowed England's Ben Stokes to be given out for obstruction. Then he failed to show any regret over not withdrawing the appeal. Not only that, but this occurred at Lords. Our players only appeal when someone is definitely out, most of the time (see below).
New Zealand isn't perfect of course, and rifling through the entire history of our sport, we have found just three transgressions - and all of them explainable.
1) Booing Quade Cooper
He deserves it.
2) Brendon McCullum runs out Muttiah Muralitharan
...when the Sri Lankan thought the ball was dead during a 2006 test in Christchurch. The bloke had used a beaming dial and Sri Lanka's nice-guy image to get away with a dodgy bowling action for years. He deserved payback.
3) Wayne Barnes
We blamed the ref for losing the 2007 World Cup, even if it was actually the quarter-final. But proof of the effect of his crime is now beyond question. Thanks to scrupulously fair refereeing ever since, we've won the next two World Cups. Case closed.
