squirrel grip

English

Etymology

A pun on two senses of nuts: the food hoarded by a squirrel, and testicles.

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

squirrel grip (plural squirrel grips)

1. (Australia, sports, colloquial, often figurative) A grip on another player's testicles; an illegal rugby tackle involving such a grip.
   • 2006, Dan Crowley, Larry Writer, Undercover Prop: The Game They Play in Heaven and a Police Career from Hell, page 75:

     Their breakaway, Philippe Chamayou, had been grabbing our lineout jumpers in the squirrel grip all match long, while ensuring we couldn't return service by wearing a cricket protector For the uneducated a squirrel grip is where an opponent grabs a player by the testicles, the most vile act in the game after eye gouging.

   • 2003, Peter Temple, Bad Debts, page 50:

     'Wootton tells me you put the squirrel grip on one of his commissioners, Jack,' Harry said.

   • 2007, Gideon Haigh, The Green & Golden Age: Writings on Australian Cricket Today, page 56:

     […] Ponting seems to have traded Waugh's ‘mental disintegration’ for what might be called the ‘psychological squirrel grip’. Of England, he gloats: ‘Mentally, we've got them by the balls.’

   • 2010, John Elias, Josh Massoud, Sin Bin: The Untold Story of a True Footy Bad Boy, page 82:

     Anything went in that competition - fingers ripping your nostrils, being spat at. The only thing I didn't encounter was a squirrel grip.