The Most Popular Stories Of 2013 On Balls.ie Part 1

January 2013 may seem like just yesterday but it's not, not nearly. The Jan 13 version of you and me had plenty of hope in rugby, a tangible air of defeat and shoulder shruggedness about football and a cocky impreza driving predictability about the future for Kilkenny.

How sorta wrong we were.. This is the news, from January to April, so, in anyways.

January

Lance Armstrong, what a prick, he was the main story in township Balls in the first cold month and indeed first month of the year. We all flocked to our TV screens with our pitchforks and excuses, he was there, and here we all were in each of our living rooms with Paul Kimmage, a million different versions of him.

http://balls.ie/news/the-full-lance-armstrong-interview/

In other as important news, the internet coughed up a glorious old image from Dublin's Red Box where a troubled blonde met a beefcake Belvederian.

Read the full-ish story - http://balls.ie/rugby/when-young-cian-healy-met-peroxide-odriscoll/

 

February

Traditionally the month when RTÉ first switch on the subtitle machine in Montrose due to the introduction of Hook and McGurk, February was all about promise and reality. What an amazing first half against Wales with that ZEBO flick and all and all, and then there was the rest of the month

Paul Ring penned a glorious guide to becoming a hipster, so hip in fact that a continental magazine reprinted it, in full, without asking the Corkman. The biggest scandal since the woman left Buttevant and went up to the city, where they had buses with wheels.

The story went on to become one of the most popular of the year.

We also had the best GAA sign of the year and it was only fuckin February, Jesus what was in store the rest of the year!?

March

Club finals and the deciding of the wooden spoon, that's March for you in days gone by.This year is was about good will to all men, even Austrians here in Dublin.

So the story goes that a few Austrians got mugged of their possessions while taking in the sights and sounds of Dublin in the days before the big match against Trap's Ireland. Irish fans stood up and were counted, raising funds to send the Austrians to the game and witness another robbery, this time in their favour.

On the pitch another giant killing story was catching the attention with brighton's Ashley Barnes taking his frustration out on the referee during a game against Bolton - http://balls.ie/football/ashley-barnes-trips-referee/ - apparently his defence of "but we were playing fckin Bolton" didn't make much of a difference and he took the ban on the chin.

Elsewhere, the world discovered Duffnering, as did we and as did you.

April

Traditionally a month where Premiership pretenders stumble and fools are celebrated, we had an early contender for Youtube Call Out Of The Year with the Belfast boxing crew making an appeal to the Joyce's.

One of the major talking points of the year began as thousands and thousands of us asked the question, "Why the fck did Dave Kearney put his head there?" Take it in, and ask yourself the question again.

Finally in April, (a month coincidentally which had only 29 days before Julius Caesar stuck his nose in and added a day.) - John Dodge jumped into his triple a powered time machine and took us on a journey to the last time Ireland played in America, a time when Joe Lapira stood for freedom, hope and Steve Staunton's scouting ability.