The Warriors’ abysmal decision making wasn’t the only cock up on display Friday night.

The fact Chad Townsend didn’t know the score, tried for a field goal, which let’s be honest has never been a Warriors strong point, is not something that can be easily forgiven.

Field and game awareness I would have thought is a given at that level.

Anyway, what of course stood out apart from the fact they took a win and blew it, was the fact we were reliving the dark old days of early Covid – no crowds.

And why was that? Because Australia, like us and indeed the Warriors, have taken an advantage and blown it.

Australia’s story is slightly different if they hadn’t panicked about AstraZeneca, they would be out the other side now given their CSL business in Melbourne would have produced millions of doses.

Morrison finally worked that out last week when he lined up young people and told them to ring their doctor and get on with it, and they did.

But like the Warriors, New Zealand and Australia opened well, locked the border, but instead of going on with it, got complacent and lazy, forgot the score, forgot the big picture, lost urgency and here we are in July treading water.

The sport I watch these days has crowds: F1, Wimbledon, the NBA playoffs, the Stanley Cup, the Tour de France, the golf, the euros. Sport globally is back in front of crowds.

The exceptions are the Olympics – why? Because Japan has failed, like us, to roll out vaccines.

What was once a massive advantage - i.e. we didn’t get over whelmed by cases - is now slipping away in front of our eyes  as every man and his dog has taken the obvious steps around vaccination and got on with it.

We want to get on with it, don’t we? But because of a combination of complacency ineptitude and ideology, we have blown it.

Never forget it was us who used to smugly run headlines about having the biggest crowds in the world. Well look at us now: empty stadia, lockdowns, level adjustments.

Is it July 2021 or July 2020? How far have we really come when a year on? We have gone next to nowhere, and the world is looking in their rear view mirror at us