One game left?
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4th April 2009
“Whatever you do, don’t mention the war” – Basil Fawlty
It seems like a long time ago now, but this week I was reminded of my first ever match report. It was a game against Letchworth back in October last year and I wrote my usual unnecessarily long pile of inaccurate bull-shit followed by an apology at the end. Unfortunately this particular report was instantly taken off the website because it contained comments about the referee and I was labelled an “idiot” for writing them. Well true to my label I thought I’d print those comments again (now that the situation has died down obviously). It really wasn’t that bad - I had included an item at the end of the report where I rated the referee and on this occasion I gave him 7 out of 10 and said, “…not bad, but liked the sound of his own voice…” Not a bad score I thought and as a player on the team that lost by 40-odd points I could easily have been a lot grumpier and bitter! Anyway, I was told in no uncertain terms not to comment on the refereeing again. Since then I have written 16 more squeaky clean reports but unfortunately this week I’m afraid I’m going to break that rule… although perhaps not in the way you’d expect.
It would be really easy for me to write about how the referee awarded a penalty try for dissent after he had given a penalty for hands in the ruck (whilst I am usually blissfully unaware of the rules, apparently referees are not supposed to award penalty tries for this reason), or I could write about how 4 of their 8 tries included forward passes Dan Marino would have been proud of (2 of which were also flagged as forward by the linesman). I could write about these things and many more and use them as excuses for why we lost 50-10 at home to Old Albanians 3’s but I won’t. The reason why we lost wasn’t because of the referee; it was because on the day we weren’t good enough. We treated the referee with no respect and we paid the price. The way we disputed every decision meant we got everything we deserved. Hopefully we will learn our lesson a bit quicker than the England team and realise that “The referee is king, worship him, pay him taxes, do whatever you must do but don’t piss him off because he is all powerful” South African Coach, Brendan Venter (soon to be in charge at Saracens). I mean for fucks sake, if a South African can work that out it can’t be that hard.
Okay so OA’s had some very good players and even if we hadn’t got on the wrong side of the referee I doubt we would have beaten them. Certainly, with the quality of players they turned out I was a little surprised that they couldn’t manage to find two props. This resulted in uncontested scrums from the start and unquestionably favoured the away team. Ironically Sawston had managed to field the biggest front 5 I can remember and for some weird reason they were actually looking forward to scrummaging. OA’s main strength was in their back play and to be honest it would have still probably torn us apart without such a solid, uncontested base. They were mostly colts (yes I mean colts and that is not a misspelling) who ran like white versions of Usain Bolt. In particular their winger was ridiculously quick. When he ran past me for the 3rd time I considered trying to fling some shit at him using a shovel just to see if it would catch him. I suspect it wouldn’t have.
Taking the positives, Sawston improved in the second half. We stopped whining and giving away unnecessary penalties and once Don came back on after 10 minutes rest we managed to keep all 15 players on the pitch. Two players even scored their first tries of the season. In just his second game ever, Will scored a fantastic try after a mesmerising 60 yard run. It is a good job he scored as, in typical Sawston style, all his support was just staring at him 30 yards away. Wilf then scored his first of the season with a not so spectacular 60mm carry from the back of a ruck. Still, they both scored 5 points and at least gave Sawston some reward for a very physically and mentally exhausting afternoon chasing shadows… and in the first half, the referee. Well done lads.
The good news is that it looks like there will be at least one more game this season so we can put this one behind us before the summer… I hope.
Team: Dan, Callum, Chris S, Will, Ash, Jay, Nick, Joe, Wilf, Nab, Don, Nudger, Theo, Vipers, Pete.
Subs: Martin for Will.
Scorers: Will, Wilf.
Sawston Star Man: Will ran very hard at the OA’s defence at every opportunity. His try involved running through at least 6 or 7 players, all of which had tackled well at other times in the game. The only explanation I can think of is that they must have taken pity on his dodgy dress sense and decided to give him a free try. Well done Will, there really aren’t enough linen suits and baby pink sweaters around these days.
Vipers Award for Idiocy: I have been guilty of doing this myself but Ashleys miscued clearance kick was a particular highlight of the match for me. Sliced off the side of his foot it went no more than 5 yards. The good news this week is that I have had a count back and Ashley has now won the award 3 times and Vipers has won it 3 times. With (probably) one game to go who will win the crown of being the clubs biggest idiot? Tune in next time to find out.
The small print
This article does not represent the views of Sawston rugby club and may not bear any resemblance to real events. In fact it is unlikely to bear any resemblance to real events. This article is not intended to offend anyone (especially referees) so please treat it with the humour with which is was intended. The author does not pretend to comprehend the rules and is unlikely to account much for forward play as he does not understand it.
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