Homan - Baa Baas ambassador!

Quote of the day:

"I've had enough of you, you, him and everything"

.... the ref!

A day for champagne rugby, I think not! The rain was horizontal and so nearly was the ref but more of that later! A nifty move by the Sutton and Epsom club captain after hearing about the speed and agility of the Black Baa Bass switched the opposition from the third fifteen to the Development Squad. The news was greeted with the usual groans muted enthusiasm in the Legless that morning. Just what you want to hear with a massive hangover; twice as much running than usual.

After finally arriving at the pitch, which was the most exposed piece of land inside the M25, the game commenced with a sideways sloping pitch and a stupidly strong crosswind. I lost the toss, something I seem to do regularly, er….. with a coin that is. Uphill and into the wind for the first half that game was to be won or lost in the next 40 minutes. The conditions were not conducive for running rugby and Marcus Jefferson had the unenviable position of trying to catch the ball after it moved all over the place out of the back of the scrum but he managed it with great handling skills. The forwards absolutely demolished the opposition up front, thanks to some great driving in the powerhouse positions of 4 and 5, by Simon Slee and Darrell M-F.

We were almost too strong as it was almost impossible to control the ball at the base of the scrum after driving forward that hard and fast. Line outs were remarkable, maybe the wind actually helped Kev, but what was certain, the debut by Ian J-H secured a lot of ball jumping in the line out and cleaning around the fringes of the rucks. Unfortunately the main job for the backs was in defence, which was done with great authority and pressure by Lachy and Gareth causing the opposition to spill ball and to force the unexpected errors. Being the young and fit side the Development Squad were supposed to be they tried to run it out of everywhere which played into our hands and we entered half time 3 tries up.

That was the start of the end, with the Baa Baas coming down hill and down wind in the second half, the only way we were going to lose was to miss tackles or give away too many penalties. The latter did happen and enabled the opposition to score a couple of tries but the game was already won. The opposition coach did not think so but he was alone in his view, and he ended up taking it out on the referee which would have come to blows had it not been for the ambassadorial qualities of Homer coming in between them. The ref was an arse so maybe that was the worst play of the day!

Damian Maltwood

Team List:

Abrahams, Bowden, Ellis, Slee, Mclennen-Fordyce, Jensen-Humphries, Flather, Homan, Jefferson, Ross, Williams, Monroe, Culley, Maltwood