The West Country’s Premier Rollercoaster aka Plymouth Albion

As a long serving supporter of our great club and one of the few who has to travel long distance to get to every game (London Welsh is the closest), I would like to summarise the season so far from my perspective. Having only missed three of the games so far this season, due to work, and having travelled far and wide I have seen some fantastic rugby and also some pretty dire performances.  

When Shanners was announced as Nat’s replacement there were some raised eyebrows, but the general feeling from this site and talking to others during pre-season was one of optimistic excitement, let’s face it having endured the last few years of instability both on and off the pitch any change would bring something new! As new players (and coaches) were announced and some old faces moved to pastures new the general buzz around the club was palpable, a new feeling of openness was evident reminiscent of glasnost during the last days of the Soviets, promises of a new style of rugby were made and the faithful, whilst guarded, awaited the result.

Pre-season gave us some hope as the team showed its potential and the open style that had been pledged.  Yes, the opposition were generally from lower leagues, but they showed that they were after the prestige of claiming a big scalp and gave us some good rugby to watch. Buoyed by this form we started the season at Sandy Park and for once were allowed into the hallowed areas normally reserved from the Chiefs fans exclusively. In front of a large crowd and a national TV audience Albion and Jersey played the better of the day’s two matches and put on a display of running rugby that shocked those not in the know, even the Sky team said “watching Plymouth this season will be fun”. Filled with a new spirit of anticipation we moved home to play Moseley in another thriller, the full reward was not achieved but the game gave real entertainment. A short hop up the road to Oxford for our big test – the whole day was a disappointment not a good result, some poor facilities and as for catering…!  Back home to play the other London exiles' another good game with the wrong result as far as we were concerned.

Four games into the Greene King IPA Championship and it was time for the B&I to start. Could this give us a chance to correct the errors that had started to show? - a general lack of discipline, some poor contact skills, scrummaging and lineouts that seemed somewhat of a lottery and our inability to keep 15 men on the park.   Nottingham came to Brickfields and looked a shadow of their former selves, then the long trip to Stirling and another convincing win. The season was back on track (or so we thought), Jersey(last years bogey team) awaited us in St Peter and despite some unorthodox travel arrangement by the team another W was claimed. Some were speculating that Alton Towers were to sponsor us for the remainder of the season due to the roller-coaster ride we were having.

Bristol who were much hyped and talked about as being contenders were the next team in out sights. We could have maybe even should have beaten them but let it slip away - a trend was appearing. Ealing put up a good fight but were dispatched with some class on a paddy field of a pitch on a wet Friday night in the capital and no cards (yippee).  Then the long trip to Meadow Lane to play the struggling Nottingham and despite the best efforts of both teams to lose a lack lustre encounter dominated by the officials we managed to keep a losing bonus point. The team looked shell shocked and have only a short break to recover before Friday and the match with underperforming Bedford.

Our recent performances have lacked the decision and penetration of the start of the season, this might be due to key injuries, or the weather making it hard to keep the ball, or the opposition preventing us playing the style of rugby we want to, or maybe just plain old bad luck.  We have seen flashes of brilliance from players throughout the team and great defence, this has been balanced with some poor discipline giving away crucial penalties (and cards), turnovers conceded and not playing for 80 minutes to enable us to close out games.  Can we get better? – yes. Will we? – I hope so. Will it take a lot? – probably not, we are still a team in transition the players are on the whole young and still developing, guided by the “old” heads I am positive that we will bounce back and when we do will cause a shock or two.  No one seems to be getting too carried away with either our wins or loses and come the end of the season we will be mid table and looking forward to challenging to climb the table next time. 

The straps are tight, now hold on this ride is not over yet...

(Note: This article was written before the Bedford game, with the aim of promoting debate on the site. Publication has been delayed slightly due to technical reasons.)