Aha, I have real sports again. None of this stopping play every 30 seconds for a breather.
It has been a good weekend in the Heineken Cup. The games between Perpignan and Ospreys, and Wasps and Leinster, were both very entertaining despite the wrong side winning both. Thankfully this just means that both pools go down to the wire next weekend, so there is more excitement to come.
Will, commiserations if you are reading this, but Quins still look well placed.
There should be some great games tomorrow as well. Thanks to Glasgow’s amazing win in Toulouse, Bath have a chance to go top of their Pool. The Gloucester-Cardiff game should be a cracker.
In other news my little local team are having a great run in the EdF National Cup, which is sort of like the FA Cup for rugby except that it doesn’t include the Premiership sides. Today we won a 4th Round match, which puts us into the last sixteen and provides a very real chance of a game against a glamor 1st Division side such as Leeds Carnegie, Exeter Chiefs, Cornish Pirates or London Welsh. All very exciting.
You missed out on Munster hammering Salle Friday night.
It was my first match back in the city after being away. 10,000 extra capacity in Thomond Park makes a huge difference in the pubs around town – its now possible to get a seat in a pub (Jerry Flannery’s bar happens to be my local) by turning up only an hour early for the match. Although I imagine that will change again for a home quarter final.
Michael:
Yes, I did. My apologies. Though Munster doing well at this stage is hardly newsworthy, is it? I was pretty sure that your boys were going to win that pool, and they have, barring a disaster in Montauban.
Here’s hoping that the city still has beer left after the quarter final.
I watched the game in dodgy internet-o-vision.
It has taken me until this morning to relax about it, and put the result in context.
Last year in the HC all we got was 2 losing bonus points in all the group games, this year we’ve beaten Stade home and away, Scarlets away and Ulster at the Stoop.
Ulster, who did not travel well to the Stoop before christmas, are much better at home and beat Munster very recently. They played the conditions better though I thought that 13 points at half time was the bare minimum lead they needed.
The weather was amazingly foul, they even had to evacuate a stand part way through the second half because of health and safety fears that the roof was going to blow down.
Quins backchat to the somewhat erratic referee was stupid (dare i say arrogant?) and cost us six points. Care’s yellow for kicking the ball away was stupid (and rather ironic given that Dawson had got away with booting the ball out of the scrum on at least two occasions, the first which resulted in their try.)
Ulster had us up front in the first half but were clearly under severe pressure with about 20 mins to go, hence the penalty try. I thought it was fortunate timing for them to have to go to uncontested scrums almost immediately after that…
All in all Ulster won the playing the referee aspect of the game, managing to slow down the game down without censure in the last quarter.
The penalty they gave away on their 22 at about the 70th minute, was, for me, given the closeness of the game a yellow card offence.
The fact that Deano had oddly decided to bring on Malone instead of Nick Evans, and the fourth official insisted the change happened before the penalty kick could be taken was just the icing on the cake.
But when things aren’t going your way you have to raise your game : Quins didn’t. Ulster played better and did what they had to do to win the game.
All in all Quins did not create much, had a chance to win but probably wouldn’t have deserved it.
So apologies if this comes across as moaning, it is just an indication of how far Quins have come this season that I’m annoyed we lost a game that we might have nicked at the death at a venue where visitors rarely win in european games.
On to Scarlets next week and through efforts earlier in the season our destiny is still in our hands and does not rely on other results going or way, if we win we go through.
Obviously if the Scarlets could do us a favour this afternoon that would be great.
The slightly worrying thing is that Quins have suffered a hang over since the Stade games, resulting in a few losses and a home draw. Combined with a number of injuries (we had our 3rd choice hooker starting yesterday) it does mean that our season is finely balanced. Do we push on from here or fade away?
Will:
You are starting to sound like an Ospreys supporter, all “should have been”. 🙁
I don’t think you’ll have too much trouble against the Scarlets at Twickenham. They are, to put it mildly, in a right mess. But they just might pull a surprise at home today and save you the bother.
I, however, will be glued to the Gloucester – Cardiff game.
“You are starting to sound like an Ospreys supporter, all “should have been”. ”
hopefully not quite that bad… 😉
just annoyed at how we played, all the rest is just post-match dissection over a ‘virtual’ beer.
i was just hoping that for once my team might have wrapped things up in a non-nerve wracking manner. But not for nothing do we have the picture of a clown on our crest.
Bloody Hell!