Pirates preview

We don’t have painters now of course because cameras have been invented. The ones that are left have had to diversify and start decorating houses instead. That Michael Angelo saw the potential in walls and ceilings early on and got ahead of the game to be fair to him, not bad for a bloke named after a ninja turtle. 

 Anyway, I digress. 

 The point is that it’s been proven that it’s warmer and nicer down south and I think it would be good to watch rugby in the nice weather for a bit longer before it gets cold. 

 The weather’s supposed to be nice this weekend when the lads make the long trip down to play the Cornish Pirates who, despite their best efforts, are still established at the Mennaye Field.  

 Until fairly recently the sunshine and a few decent beers were the only positives that we could take from a visit to the Mennaye as we would usually end up on the wrong end of a beating. On our last two visits though, it's the Pirates who've been left walking the plank as we've legged it back up the motorway with 5 points in the bag on both occasions. 

 It would be pushing it to say that he’s a familiar face as he never made a senior appearance in Yorkshire colours, but young fly half Will Cargill is already looking like an inspired signing for the Pirates having joined from our academy in the summer. 

 After warming the bench as understudy to Kieran Hallett for the first three games, he made his full debut at Ealing last week and finished up with a try, a conversion and a penalty to his name for a personal 10 point haul in what turned out to be a 28-17 defeat. If selected on Sunday, I expect he'll be pretty fired up for a game against his former club. 

 So far this season, going purely on the scorelines, their 2 home games have resulted in one narrow victory (against Notts on the opening day) and one narrow defeat (at the hands of the Titans). They don’t score many points, but they don’t concede many either. 

 To my mind, following last week's defeat to London Scottish, it's important that we win this game. If we don't then a promising start to the season (4 wins and 1 defeat) will turn into a distinctively average one (3 wins and 2 defeats). It's a big ask all the way down there but, if you're going to slip up in your home games, then you put yourself under pressure in the away ones. 

 That said, I'm backing the lads to take full advantage of the glorious southern climate,complete a hat-trick and come away with a very narrow win. 

 Enjoy the game if you're going. 

Come on Yorkshire!