Prof’s Positives week 5 – Sale (sorry Sharks)

By The Prof
October 3 2002

Having just survived hurricanes, earthquakes and unexplained death in Mexico City I headed home. OK just arrived back after an eleven hour flight – turn on mobile phone for the first time - get message from BatQuin – select it – read it – and… and… oh, we lost.

With RugbyBird’s fabulous deputisation after the thrashing of London Irish last week I was hoping to have an easy ride with this edition of Prof’s Positives.

Let me first say that I was over the Atlantic when the game against Sale was on so the only Quins game I have seen in the last week or so was the Ladies v. Plymouth Albion. But I think the marvellous reports and reviews by Binky and PerryGo have given me enough information to accentuate the positives.

So we lost, but we lost away from home against one of the top teams from last season, we had eight players out injured and by most accounts we outplayed Sale. So what of the performance itself?

Let’s start with the pack – they seem to have been playing better and better since the Leicester game (apart from that one dreadful scrum against Leeds). Jase seems to be playing with a new found vigour and on the other side of the scrum Gomez is proving to be a mighty scrummager. In the centre of the front row we have Tani Fuga who has been playing out of his skin since his return from injury – Woody will have to work hard to get his place back. The second row (Davison and Evans) performed well with Evans showing good skills and speed around the park. This was one position where we thought that we were very light in at the beginning of the season but Codders, Davison, Evans and Rudzki have performed very well in every game so far.

The back row had a great game collectively with Dippy showing his fabulous handling skills, Pat outplaying his brother and Ace being a huge force in attack and defence (if only he could avoid getting binned regularly). The ‘sexy rolling mauls’ that Binky described seem to be a successful attacking option if only the referees would prevent the opposition pulling them down without punishment. Could the good performances from the pack be in some part down to the return of JK to full time work after his illness?

The backs are looking good in defence and are making a lot of chances. The current centre of pairing of Greenstock and Satala are working well together, with the ‘semi-retired’ Greenstock seeming to be playing with a supercharged Zimmer frame! Remember neither player was seen as being first choice at the beginning of the season. Nathan Williams seems to have settled in well and is playing very well indeed with his attacking play and tactical kicking being especially impressive. He has also been working well with the two wingers Gollings (or is it Gellings, Collings, Gillings or even Frodo?) and Moore. Duncombe is on his way back from his foot injury and adds another dimension in attacking play from behind the scrum.

The forwards and backs have been combining well in open play and even though none of the backs scored they played big parts in the build up to both tries scored by the flankers (Sanderson and Sherriff). All players have been putting themselves on the line and have been producing teeth rattling tackles again and again.

The timing of Evs and Scotty pulling off some of the bigger players or those returning from injury seems to be a good ploy.

Codders should be back for next week giving us extra presence in the line out and all of the other players missing are one week closer to playing again and Vos is another week closer to starting for Quins (and apparently he had a blinding game last weekend in South Africa against the Falcons – hopefully a good omen for this Saturday.

Around the rest of the club Leah Carey has been selected for the England U19 training squad and she scored a good try in the Ladies game against Plymouth. The Quins U19s beat Leeds U19s 16-10 and although the U21s lost heavily it seems that the pack played very well. The Amateurs also won against Kilburn Kosmos.

Let’s all get behind out teams this coming week – we have Newcastle at The Stoop on Saturday playing before the Ladies take on Rosslyn Park on the same pitch. The seconds are playing away against Sarries on Monday and all three amateur sides are playing on Saturday.