Goodwill to all, with some exceptions

Ilove Christmas. All that eating and drinking, all the presents. It’s the one time of the year when no-one frowns upon a daytime nap, either.

Without fail, though, the one thing that says yuletide bliss for me is Dean Martin singing Silver Bells. Fantastic. So Santa, if you’re reading this, here’s my Christmas wishlist for the 12 months ahead.

First, let’s look after each other. Let’s stay well and drive safely and treat one another with kindness.

A lot of us are doing it tough these days. We feel life keeps bombarding us with problems and that there are various pressures and expectations that are impossible to live up to.

Let’s stop a minute to see how others are feeling and let’s actually listen when they tell us, rather than launch into five minutes about how we’re going. Let’s spare a thought for people and make sure they’re OK and maybe think about how a kind word and some genuine care brightens our own day.

Let’s have some meaningful professional sport, not just games to fill coffers and pay players. Not games to fulfil television schedules and satisfy master agreements, but games that feature the best athletes at the peak of their powers playing because they want to win.

Let’s hope the All Blacks lose. A lot.

Winning just three of their six tests (against awful opposition) in 2020 seems to have satisfied the rugby public, so our only hope of change is going to be a catastrophic run of defeats. Maybe then we’ll get the chorus required to see Ian Foster sacked as head coach.

Or have people become so apathetic it’s only the true cheerleaders who are watching any more?

Let’s spend less time living through the deeds of athletes. Let’s stop sanctifying them in syrupy profile pieces and hailing their various triumphs over adversity. Instead, let’s maybe spare a thought for people we actually know and who know and care about us too.

Let’s not let nationalism blind us. Events such as the Olympics and America’s Cup can promote a strain of triumphalism that isn’t that attractive, so let’s try and be good winners or losers whatever the code or competition is.

Let’s hope fewer cheats prosper. That more results and times and distances and performances can be taken at face value.

Let’s try and succumb to less hype. Let’s not let marketeers tell us how great something or someone is, but actually decide for ourselves.

Let’s hope the Black Caps’ test schedule for 2021 is better than it looks. As it stands, a test tour to England in 2022 is all we have to look forward to.

There’s a steady diet of Twenty20 cricket, against a procession of mediocre opponents, but little against any opponent of any note.

Last summer’s trip to Australia was an absolute disaster, and we continue to wait for a series that puts the deeds of these Black Caps into a meaningful perspective.

Let’s continue to embrace community sport. Let’s be active ourselves and encourage our friends and loved ones to participate too.

Let’s give children the opportunity to fail. To learn from mistakes, to accept disappointment. Let’s praise their attitude and their effort and not dwell on the outcomes. Have winners and losers by all means, but let’s remain dignified about it all.

Let’s stop reporting press releases as if they’re news. Let’s ask people uncomfortable questions and let’s make them justify their actions, salaries and their sometimes exalted positions.

Let’s stop accepting reports that fail to find fault or to lay blame.

Let’s actually make sure that people are made accountable for the mistreatment of female athletes rather than merely express our dismay. Let’s just stop allowing them to be assaulted and fat-shamed and abused in the flaming first place.

Let’s stop talking a good game and let’s get on and actually do something. –

‘‘Let’s hope the All Blacks lose. A lot.’’