RIP Cyrille Regis

Cyrille Regis was a stylish centre-forward for West Brom back when I was playing in the under 10s. Regis caught the eye in English soccer as one of few black players. But in this West Brom team he had the company of Brendan Batson and Laurie Cunningham. This team was beautiful to watch; I recall them usually wearing yellow and green stripes but I think that was their away strip. Which in those days (they are away in this game) you only wore if required to avoid a clash.

The black players were routinely booed just for their skin colour. It starts when Cunningham gets the ball at 2:15 but then stops dead as he sets up a lovely West Brom goal. Good on the commentator for highlighting it. Regis and Cunningham particularly copped a lot of abuse but persisted. When Regis was selected to play for England he got a bullet in the post with a message "if you set foot on our Wembley we'll shoot you in the knee". It would be great to think that's all long ago and far away but Adam Goodes would probably disagree.

There's so many highlights in this old game; an unexpected one is the goalkeeping of Gary Bailey. The save at 8:19 is as good as you'll see. Then there's the drop ball in front of goal, and the players caught offside from a keeper's long kick.  And the snow!

Hands off our Aussie anti-semitic ratbag!!!

I was quite shocked by a story in The Age this morning. A retired Australian teacher was arrested on a plane at Heathrow. His name is Gerald Frederick Toben, and he runs something called the Adelaide Institute - it sounds quite anodyne but is in fact a mouthpiece for his virulently anti-Semitic views. Toben spent seven months in jail in Germany in 1994 for inciting racism.

When arrested yesterday, he was in transit on his way from the United States to Dubai. He is now being held for extradition to Germany to face fresh charges. He has breached various Australian court orders to remove his website and cease his activities. From what I can tell he is a reprehensible person, and his website runs the gamut from ratbag to plain vile.

What made me sit up straight was the fact he was arrested in London, on a European warrant, to be tried in Germany for crimes committed in Australia. His website allows him to broadcast his extremist views into any country in the world (unless that country takes the China approach and filters the web on behalf of its citizens). Now it appears the breadth of his reach is being turned against him.

In his case I won't miss him if he spends 5 years in jail in Germany. But the principle is interesting. Presumably ignorance of the laws of other countries is no excuse. How about you and I? Are we sure we aren't breaking the libel, obscenity or privacy laws of Saudi Arabia, Iran or China on our websites?