VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

20:30:25, Tue, May 21 2024 [ Login ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, [3] ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 18:17:05, Sun, Oct 02 2005
Author: dom_pedro
Subject: An SC refugee's view of the LI v Wasps Match

[Apologies for making this a 'personal' account of the match rather than a 'technical' one.]

It came to me someway through the second half, when Irish were pressing against the the Wasps line. I was doing that old East-Stand-Late-September-Early-October-Salute, trying to deflect the glare of the sun to see whether Rowden had given the scrum to Irish or Wasps, when I suddenly realised that I had really quite missed seeing Irish.

I'd grown used to the Sunday morning ritual of getting up early, sorting breakfast for my two boys and then putting the computer on to login and listen to the webcast. I only ever listened to about a third of the match as I'd be doing other things as you do when you have toddlers at breakfast time. That was how it was for a full year while exiled in Washington State (which was without doubt one of the best years imagineable). But I was back in the Madjet doing the same salute as many others in the east stand, thoroughly enjoying the afternoon, yet somehow knowing that the fact that Wasps had not scored a try in the first half was just not quite right and that to be honest it wouldn't last.

It didn't and we lost, but hell I enjoyed my first live rugby match for over a year no end. I enjoyed taking my American friend, who'd grown up on grid iron and the poor Mariners baseball team, as he kept saying things like 'this is brutal' and 'wow, so cool, this is fascinating'. I enjoyed my pint in Callaghan's (and it still amazes me that no-one else drinks there before matches) and even the poor excuse for Guinness served at the Madjet went down well (by the way, if you buy your beer at half time don't expect it to be fresh since they poor hundreds of pints in advance of the half-time rush).

If you're somehow expecting some incite into why we lost, well don't look at me. Staniforth played well and I thought his try saving tackle (Wasps break from our 10m line) was superb; Flutey had a great debut with just a couple of dodgy up-and-unders and maybe not quite enough yardage on the penalties to touch; our old mate Sackey had a subdued match until he saw his opportunity to leave a mark on the game or at least the up and coming Topsy Ojo (a yellow card offence perhaps and had it been in the Wasps 22 a penalty try maybe, but ho-hum) and lets face it, when it looked like Wasps were possibly going to lose they brought on a few old World Cup winners off the bench to up the tempo a bit (I thought Doo-Lally might have changed out of his blue jeans to come on late to help out).

Amusing things from the afternoon were the kids behind us who finally after 20 minutes of the game explained to their very enthusiastic mate that Irish weren't the ones wearing grey and again my American friend at his first ever rugby match saying: "So the offensive team have to stay their side of the ball and the defensive team stay their side of it and they have to move forward to score a try but only by throwing the ball backwards". Err, yes exactly, but it's more complicated than that.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

[> Re: An SC refugee's view of the LI v Wasps Match -- Gabriel, 20:33:41, Sun, Oct 02 2005 [1]

It looks like we have a rugby team!
I have never enjoyed a match we lost so much...if you know what I mean. Rikki is a great find and indeed the whole team was great. I think they should be very proud of themselves.


[ Edit | View ]

[> Re: An SC refugee's view of the LI v Wasps Match -- dom_pedro, 13:22:04, Mon, Oct 03 2005 [1]

Agreed, I liked the way when Flutey first got his hands on the ball very early on, he was already looking to break through a gap. I should have also made special mention in my review of Delon Armitage's performance which I thought was pretty good. The clever chip for Ojo's try and a special mention of the tackle on Erinle (though it lead to O'Connor's try unfortunately). Seeing Erinle running full pelt at Delon I felt sure Delon was going to get walked over - he didn't and stopped the Wasp in his tracks. Excellent.


[ Edit | View ]

[> Re: An SC refugee's view of the LI v Wasps Match -- loobs, 5:33:31, Tue, Oct 04 2005 [1]

Nice one D-P, glad your mate enjoyed it. The tackling is even fiercer this season than last season, there is a real aggression there.

The last time I felt as good about losing was away to Glos a few seasons ago, when Sackey bagged a brace and was SOOOOO close to a third which at the time would have won us the game. I think that was also a cup game. Does that mean that the expectation being lower lifts us off the player's backs? Or does it mean that the lack of pressure lifts the players?


[ Edit | View ]


Forum timezone: GMT+0
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.