Rugby Mad Blog

Saracens won an important victory against Sale to keep their Guinness Premiership playoff hopes alive.

The Men In Black went ahead by 21 points to 0 initially. Ben Skirving managed a try, as did Prop Cencus Johnston, who scored from a remarkable 20-metre run, evading three tackles to cross the line. Glen Jackson added five kicks to the score too.

[Sebastien Chabal, looking like Neanderthal Man]

[Richard Haughton makes a try-saving tackle]

Sale’s very own Neanderthal Man Sebastien Chabal scored a try, as did Oriel Ripol, but Richard Haughton managed to save another with this tackle above. The final score was 24-20. See more photos from this match.

I’ve had a stupidly busy few days, so haven’t been able to write much until now. Saracens beat Sale Sharks on Sunday at Watford, in the pouring rain.

Thanks to some nightmare traffic, I only arrived in time for the second half, which annoyed me somewhat. But I had a new lens to try out at the game, and was keen to give it a spin despite the rain:

[Mates in Mud, Mark Cueto and Glen Jackson pick themselves up after a roll on the turf]

The second half saw no tries (Adam Powell having scored the only one during the first half), but Jackson kicked several panalties over. The rain let up a bit, but of course, the pitch was sodden and the players soon ended up filthy – it was quite easy to play “Spot The Subsitute” when they came on from the bench:

[Spot The Subs, Sale bring on fresh legs and fresh shirts in the front row]

Sarries took the game 22-9 in the end, leaving them fifth in the table, one point behind Wasps, with a game in hand. Another home win, which must be good for team spirit. Next up is Newcastle away, then Bristol at home on 18th. You can also see more photos from the Sarries/Sale game.

And talking of Bristol, they were nilled at Wasps on Sunday too – final score 28-0. Bit worrying to see Phil Vickery suffering concussion thanks to a wayward haymaker swung by Jason Hobson – who’s already been suspended by Bristol for two weeks and faces an RFU disciplinary panel next week.

So where does that leave the current England Captain for the game against France? On the sidelines. The team will be lead by Mike Catt on Sunday, which is pretty much a crunch game for England. France have a few old faces back in their team, including The Seabass.

Newly-promoted Bristol surprised everybody (and themselves!) by beating Wasps at the weekend, to go top of the Guinness Premiership.

And there they will remain for a couple of weeks while the clubs have a fortnight of Anglo-Welsh Cup hiatus during the next two weekends.

Saracens, meanwhile, are floating in 9th place, (a familiar position from last season), after their loss to the Sharks on Friday evening.

They are away to London Irish this coming weekend, then host Cardiff Blues at Vicarage Road on 8th October. I plan to be at both matches, so there should be some new images on rugbypix.com in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, here’s a photo from Saracens’ home game against Bristol from last season, a bit of a muddy affair from memory.

Andy Gomarsall has also been on the move again, signing with Quins until the end of the season, after being unceremoniously dropped by Worcester, one year into a 3-year contract.

Here’s a photo of him at the 2005 Scrum In The Park England training session, with Sevens coach Mike Friday.

And I forgot to add them earlier, but a small selection of my photos from the London Double Header are now on Flickr.

Mr Farrell’s training is coming along nicely, apparently. He’s been in full contact sessions with his team mates as well as hitting the tackle bags. But the boss Alan Gaffney says he won’t be ready until the Brisol game on 10th September. Pity, I was looking forward to seeing him run out at Twickenham in a week’s time. Oh well. Hilly’s also making great progress, and might be back on the park by the end of October.

Also, the coaching changes at HQ may possibly tempt Jason Billy Whizz Robinson out of international retirement. He’s certainly been flying for Sale at the end of last season. And if he stays in-form this year, who knows?

Here’s a picture of Jason the day after he announced his international retirement last autumn, playing for Sale against Sarries.

I was really pleased to read Sale Sharks have won the Guinness Premiership Final against Leicester Tigers today. Good on them, they deserve it! Apparently they are the first team to top the league AND win the subsequent playoffs, since the end of the season system was rearranged.

The Tigers must be a tad gutted, but from all accounts, Sale outplayed them quite comprehensively. The lovely Mark Cueto scored a try for Sale in the first ten minutes. You may recall my mention of him as a suitable hors d’ouvres in a previous post (Feb 24th, Á La Carte Menu). But I didn’t provide a full-length picture – so here you go: Cute-O [sic] taking a fluid break during the Sarries vs Sharks game back last September.

One of my first blog entries way back on 23rd February concerned an evening called A Question of Sarries, which of course saw Scrum Half Kyran Bracken doing his marvellous impression of Sue Barker, getting trolled up in drag and acting as Question Mistress (see photo).

Last night I was fortunate enough to witness a recording of the real thing – as audience for the BBC’s A Question of Sport. In 15 years of working for the BBC, I’d never been to a show recording (it doesn’t really count when you’re working on a live broadcast, you don’t have time to watch very much!). The warm up comic was pretty terrible; some bloke from Canvey Island called Jeff. Wish we could have done without him, but once the show got going, it was very entertaining to watch.

Team captains were the usual Ally McCoist and Matt Dawson. Thought I’d throw in a gratuitous picture of Daws at this point. You can see him squaring up with three of his England pack, Andrew Sheridan, Phil Vickery and Danny Grewcock (not mentioned him in a while so thought I’d name drop again). Dawson seems to be saying “I’m as big as them!”

Anyway, I digress. Dawson’s guests were Phil Tufnell and Martin “Chariots” Ofiah. They were both pretty funny; Tuffers was terribly silly at times. Ally’s team offered us reigning World Snooker Champion – a painfully thin Scot with a weedy voice whose name I completely failed to remember. Plus Jason White, Scotland’s Rugby Union captain and Flanker for Sale Sharks. My, he’s a big lad, close-to! Hey presto, I’ve got a picture of him as well, seen here battling it out in the lineout with Ben Skirving during the Sarries vs Sharks match on 25th September 2005.

So it ended up a good-natured England vs Scotland competition. I won’t tell you who won, that would spoil the surprise. But watch out soon for transmission, I have a feeling it might be Friday 2nd June. You might even spot me in the audience if you know who you’re looking for!

Great to see Sale achieving a place in the Guinness Premiership finals, with a win over Wasps at the weekend. They deserve to go all the way as they have clearly been doing very well this season, and finished 6 points ahead at the top of the table. Wasps will have to lick their wounds and regroup for next season.

And poor old London Irish got a drubbing at Welford Road, being beaten by the Tigers 40-8, Irish’s only points coming from Olivier Magne’s try and Mike Catt’s penalty.

And talking of Catty, he makes the trip down under as part of the Enlgand squad to tour Australia in June. Glad to see there’s life in the old dog yet (or Catt, in this case). Here’s a gratuitous picture of him to fill up the blog a bit.

As a regular reader of the excellent Halfbakery website, I quite often get a chuckle out of some of the suggestions which are posted there. I came across one today that I thought was really great – not in a funny sense, but one which would actually work, a proposition for Beginners Commentary.

What struck me was this – if I’d had access to such a commentary for rugby earlier, then I would probably have been watching it for a lot longer than I have – it was really only the lack of knowledge of the laws which was stopping me from getting into it sooner

And talking of rugger, Saracens are away to Sale this evening. I don’t hold out much hope of a win, since Sale have been at the top of the table for most of this season, and as mentioned before, Saracens are going through rather a black patch at the mo. But I hope they put up a good fight!

Another juicy weekend of Six Nations games await… England v France being the one I’ve a vested interest in, although I will watch the other two on video over the weekend. I’m also looking forward to going to a friend’s Birthday lunch on Saturday, hence having to record the games that afternoon. See – despite what you may think, I do have a social life!

Another nice thing to happen today, I got an email from an old chum and we have arranged to meet up and catch up next week. We’ve known each other for, my god, 10 years now! Time flies. We met through a shared admiration for Canadian Mountie comedy/drama show Due South, and have discovered lots of shared interests in the meantime. Not least that she is a rather obsessed photographer, much like myself! It will be good to see how she is and what’s been going on lately.

Ah well, not a lot more to add today. That’s All Folks!