Any Luck For These Irish?

By Chris Chaplin
May 1 2003

As the time for the real nitty gritty of the season arrives at both ends of the premiership I’m wondering this week if London Irish can at least give those in the emerald shirts something to smile about after the results against England, Toulouse and USAP.

If things are tight at the top, Gloucester excepted, then it’s positively claustrophobic down in the basement. London Irish had not beaten a ZP team since December 29 when they comprehensively beat Newcastle but then returned to winning ways with a narrow away win against fellow strugglers Sarries. In between those wins the Reading club had beaten promotees elect Rotherham and HEC finalists Toulouse. Funny old game!

Now of course they’re in all kinds of bother with Bristol having used their game in hand against Sarries and secured a losers’ bonus point leaving Irish locked with them at the bottom of the table just separated by the same odd point.

Interestingly enough in the two remaining rounds of this year’s Premiership only Irish have a game against a side not in the bottom five and who are similarly trying to claw their way out of trouble and that game is against Tigers at Welford Road this Saturday.

Tigers, having won what the pundits like to call “an error strewn encounter”, against Leeds last Saturday, (mind you having watched the Sarries/Bristol game Tigers and Leeds looked like skill personified) look like fourth place being their best likely outcome to this relatively poor season, but if they don’t beat Irish, with points pretty unlikely the following week at Kingsholm, even this may not be attainable. Leeds have to play Glaws at Headingly and if they play as they did against us they’ll get a real spanking from the Champions elect even though Glaws are sending a much depleted team North on Saturday, but if Leeds do win and Saints do likewise and Tigers fail it’s the Wildcard malarkey for us!

I do find it a strange situation when looking at many of the players in the teams languishing at the bottom of the Premiership that they are there at all and in some ways Irish are a case in point. This time last year they were flying pretty high and Leeds were packing their bags for a return to National One, now look what’s happened, although Leeds have had their chequebook out the changes by Irish have not been so happy. Rossouw having been an abject failure at Irish is, pardon the pun, playing up a storm for Stormers.

Irish have, in my opinion, been their own worst enemy this season in persisting with an unnecessarily sterile game-plan, with the ball won by their useful pack repeatedly being kicked away by Everitt. For me their strongest front row is Worsley, who deservedly got his chance to be in the Six Nations set up this season and I hope he gets an opportunity to feature in this Summer’s tours, he’s a good prospect, strong, technically sound and very mobile. Drotske another usually dependable hard working sort and the soon to depart Halford.

At lock is one of my favourites, one Ryan Strudwick much in the Johnno mould in that he’s an uncompromising and inspirational leader and Irish are seriously incommoded when he’s not around. Partnering him is Bob Casey a young Irishman from Kildare who has already been capped five times for Ireland and is one of those difficult angular types that seem hard to hold on to as he puts himself about in the loose to some effect.

In the back-row Danaher, Dawson and Sheasby. Don’t really get too much better than that and I’ve been surprised this term that the pick and drive technique that caused their opposition such enormous trouble last season seems to have largely been consigned to the bin. Kieron Dawson has been capped 19 times for Ireland in an enormously competitive position in the Irish set-up while Danaher, who can play anywhere in the back-row, has played representative rugby for both Ireland and England and both can be quick to the break-down. Mr Christopher Sheasby completes the trio. The man for whom the description awkward was surely created with his great loping stride. I think he’s a superb player even now in the twilight of his career and it’s perhaps surprising that he won only 8 full caps for England, it seems like it was more. The only problem is that I think he sometimes tries to do too much and ends up stopping or preventing an attack starting in earnest as the opposition let him run gaily out of his own half before pegging him. Of course a Paul Gustard of our acquaintance is also in the wings - steady girls, steady!

Welshman Darren Edwards seems to start at scrum-half these days and he’s OK, not perhaps out of the top drawer of #9s but does what’s needed of him within the Irish strategy, which is to get the ball to Everitt. I’m not sure what’s happened to Hente Martens as Barrett seems to be the reserve for this position, but I’m sure someone will tell me! Fly-half? Usually old Goldenboot Everitt and while to be fair you can’t fault him in the role he’s been given he does, as a consequence, often appear one dimensional. Personally I’d like to have seen my old Glaws favourite Mark Mapletoft given more outings, he can kick, has pace and tries to and often does make things happen. Brendan Venter sadly seems to have played his last game for Irish following his collision with Cammie Mather during the Leeds game so he‘ll be missing on Saturday.

I would have thought the immensely talented South African born Geoff Appleford would have dropped in here very nicely with Burrows and probably produced a more creative and dangerous centre pairing into the bargain.

On the wings, well Paul Sackey will give Tigers’ defence something to think about, especially if balls are chipped behind and a footrace ensues. This seemeingly a standardc ploy used by all Tigers’ opposition of late. The best place to give Sackey the ball is deep in his own half and ping him before he gets out of it, which is often possible because he has a marked propensity to hang on to the ball for too long but if he gets served the right ball in the opposition’s half he’s a killer finisher.

On the other wing is something of a problem for the Irish with Roussow gone and Bishop injured I’m not sure who’ll get the berth. There was a promising lad called Thrower but I’m not at all certain he’s still there. Perhaps if he is they’ll try him at full-back and put Micheal Horak on the wing or vice-versa anyway this will be an interesting selection conundrum for Conor O’Shea, maybe Appleford will go out there again but it seems a waste.

Horak is a smashing player and exceptionally dangerous on the break however like Sackey he does seem to take the ball into contact rather too often but he’s still one to keep an eye on.

So there we are fighting for survival and if they revert to their 2001/2 strategy? Who knows. What we do know is that they’ll contest every inch.

What of Tigers then in their last home game?

It’s hard to know what to say about Tigers as with Deano’s predilection for secrecy within his fiefdom akin to that of the KGB in it’s hay-day I don’t know who’s fit and who’s not and who’s out of favour and who’s not but here goes.

Last Saturday’s victory showed one thing and that’s that there’s still plenty of the Tiger character needed to grind out a win although obviously a second match without a try being scored must surely be of concern. Given that the Leeds pack was pretty much at full strength, as was their whole side come to that, the Tigers’ make do and mend set up did pretty well. True the pack looked under pressure in the front row at times and the line out was not faultless, although I thought Deacon had a good game, it’ll not be easy against Strudwick and Casey but there should be an area of slight advantage to be used here.

In spite of being deprived of three international flankers the back row did well with young Skinner fully justifying his selection, not that there was much choice in the matter. Balding and Corry both played very well with Corry being harshly singled out by the useless Rowden for a rest. To be frank I wouldn’t be too disappointed if the same pack started against Irish, although it would be comforting to have either Josh or Backy available given the talent in the Irish back-row.

Where Tigers’ were (again) disappointing was behind the scrum. Ellis was combatative and with a bit more protection from his own back-row and the referee he could have done more but I hope he keeps his place as he could have the edge over Edwards and please with Tierney rather than Hamilton on the bench. I was encouraged by McMullen’s performance in the first half when he got the backs moving however after the break he was presumably playing to different instructions as he continually kicked in a highly speculative manner. Personally I’d give him another start as he acquitted himself well against Ross, who is one of the class #10s in the premiership and if Everitt plays the usual game there‘ll be some room to manoeuvre, if it‘s Mapletoft it‘ll be tighter. I must say that it seemed pretty surreal to have Fred at 12 while an international inside centre languished on the bench. Rod may well have had a falling out with somebody (fill in your own name) and may be leaving but I’d still like to see him show us what he can do. If Appleford and Burrows are in the centre then we’ll need to be more forceful and accurate if the Irish pairing are not to turn over ball and also regularly cross the gain line.

With Boothy now joining the injury list Fred must surely be put back where he should be on the left wing, unless Raynor is to get another start, he certainly looked sharp and fast enough and while I know it’s probably a forlorn hope to see him start I’m sure Gelderbloom could create so much more than does Leon at 13. However if history is any guide Lloyd will start and if he can be put into space and if he can hold on to the ball he could create some problems for the Irish back three, but there are an awful lot of ifs there.

Sackey’s defence can be exposed but on the other wing whether it’s Horak or Appleford they’ll be few chances.

Geordan was obviously struggling last week and it’s another mystery why an injured Geordan was preferred to a fully fit Stimmo at full-back. If he’s fit then let’s hope that Geordan’s back and against Sackey with Stimmo at 15 to kick the points that will there for the taking. Just think if he‘d been at the MadStad we could have won but without a kicker we had to keep kicking to touch and the Irish pack is not one to be meekly rolled over the line.

As I said lots of ifs and buts, however on paper the Tigers team should be more than capable of despatching London Irish and in many ways it’ll depend on what Deano and his coaches are doing this week to steady the ship with all the departures now announced combined with the ongoing injury crisis bound to be having an effect on the team‘s already lowered spirits. Not since the Dwyer days have I sensed such underlying unrest in the squad as there seems now to be, so there’s probably the biggest job of his club career ahead of Johnno over the next two weeks if he’s to steer us to HEC qualification without involvement in the unwanted Wildcard games.

Surely we’ll not be sent away from Welford Road on a low to travel to Kingsholm in hope rather than expectation . Will we? No I don’t think so, but don’t expect it to be either pretty or easy. As Sgt Estensen said in Hill St Blues - “Be careful out there”