Blues 20-6 Harlequins. 10th Oct. 2009

Went down to watch this game. As usual the day started with a hearty breakfast at Servinis. This was my first visit to the new Cardiff City Stadium in Leckwith. It was an early kick off so we headed straight for the pubs in Canton before heading to the stadium. It's only a ten minute walk from Cardiff Castle to Canton and then another ten minutes from Canton to the stadium, which is not as long as I thought it would be.

It was a bright sunny day and at kick off I was disappointed with the attendence; only 11,000. The first half was not full of high quality rugby. From a Blues perspective it wil be remembered for one thing, the injuries. Four Cardiff players went off injured, Bradley Davies, Gareth Thomas, John Yapp and most worryingly captain Paul Tito. After the break the Blues scored the first try with some tidy counter attack play that saw Leigh Halfpenny cross the line. Harlequins then started to dominate large parts of the second half. They were without their England stars Easter, Monye and Care but still caused the home side alot of problems. The balance of the game looked to have switched to Quins in the last ten minutes as they put heavy pressure on the Blues line. A certain try was on, only for Quins full back Mike Brown to knock-on yards from the line. This turned out to be the truning point of the game and the Blues pushed on to grab another try after Deniol Jones' kick forward was chased and converted by a sharp Halfpenny.
It was an average game that could have gone either way.

My man of the match. Halfpenny

Leinster 9-12 London Irish. 9th Oct. 2009

Ospreys 31-10 Edinburgh. 4th Oct. 2009

Super round-up

The end of last season the games came thick and fast and as a result I lost interest in keeping up with this blog.

I watched all the Lions tour to South Africa except the Cheetahs match on 6 June as I was in France and couldn't find anywhere showing it. There is alot to remember about the tour but if I had to pick out one memory it would be this: the turning point of the 3 match series. Early in the second half of the 2nd test, both props, Gethin Jenkins and Adam Jones were injured in the same passage of play and had to leave the field. This meant uncontested scrums for the rest of the match, and the Lions dominance from the first half was gone, and they never recovered.

A welcome consolation win in the third test restored alot of pride.

30 May:
Royal XV 25-37 Lions

3 June:
Golden Lions 10-74 Lions

6 June:
Cheetahs 24-26 Lions

10 June:
Sharks 3-39 Lions

13 June:
Western Province 23-26 Lions

16 June:
Southern Kings 8-20 Lions

20 June:
South Africa 26-21 Lions(first Test)

23 June:
Emerging Springboks 13-13 Lions

27 June:
South Africa 28-25 Lions (second Test)

4 July:
South Africa 9-28 Lions(third Test)

After the Lions I watched a couple of the Tri Nations games; South Africa wins again. And watched my first domestic game of the season the other night, the Blues grinding out thier first home win at thier new stadium against the Scarlets.

Blues 19-15 Scarlets. 26 Sep. 2009

Didn't think much of the new fly half Norton-Knight. Rush and Tito, powerful games.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/welsh/8266267.stm

More round up

Northampton 15-3 Bourgoin. 22 May 2009

Challenge Cup Final. A game full of good rugby that will be remembered for a couple of incidents that resulted in yellow cards. As the Saints asserted their dominance the French team resorted to bully boy tactics and frankly got dirty play. I was impressed with Saints hooker Dylan Hartley during this game. One of the best hooker displays I've seen for a long time.



Bulls 36-23 Crusaders. 23 May 2009

Super 14 Semi Final. A pulsating contest with the Bulls playing some superb rugby. Outside half Morne Steyn kicked 21 points, including 4 impressive drop kicks. The highlight of the match and one of the moments of the season was Spies' try. He found himself with the ball in his own half and the number showed incredible athleticism and pace to out-sprint the Crusaders backs to score under the posts. One of the best tries you'll ever see from a forward.

Leicester 16-19 Leinster. 23 May 2009. Heineken Cup Final

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Heineken_Cup_Final

Canada 23-32 Wales. 30 May 2009

http://www.setanta.com/UK/Articles/other-sports/2009/05/30/Rugby-Canda-v-Wales-report/gnid-55111/

Cardiff Blues 26-26 Leicester (aet). 3 May 2009

Went down to watch the Heineken Cup semi final at the Millenium stadium. It was a Sunday and Cardiff was not as busy. There is definitely a better atmosphere on a Saturday in the city. Cardiff Rugby club was virtually empty three hours before kick-off.

The first half was fairly evenly contested until Leicester wing Hamilton touched down after a telling break from Flood. This first try increased Leicester's confidence and they continued to dominate the possession well into the second half. A second try early in the after the break saw the Leciester take their lead to 26-12. With only twenty minutes it was getting pretty grim for the Blues. They weren't played bad but they couldn't quite get the better of Leicester's excellent defence. At fourteen points down and in the 74th minute the Blues had a line out in Leicester's half. This was to be the start of an incredible 6 minutes of rugby from the home side. Clean line out ball was secure and I watched the Blues backline go through a planned move. My eye was drawn to the arcing run that Jamie Roberts was making. Shanklin, the outside centre came in as decoy runner and Roberts drifted outside to latch on to a great pass from Nicky Robinson. Roberts then burst through the midfield defence and sprinted towards Leicester's twenty two. The Leicester fullback wasn't near him and Roberts had enough pace to cross the line for an excellent team try. It was great watching it from my position in the stand. Ben Blair converted a difficult kicked.

Leicester restarted and the Blues received the ball in their own twenty two. What followed turned out to be one of the tries of the season. The ball found it's way to Jamie Roberts and he made the telling break through the midfield defence again. He got his way to the half line and passed to Tom James on the wing who put the burners on and sprinted towards the line. In a classic bit of wing play he went round the covering defender and had enough gas to score in the corner. The stadium erupted, was this to be an amazing comeback? Ben Blair kicked another superb conversion to level the scores and the final whistle came too soon for Cardiff.

Twenty minutes of extra time, ten minutes each way, turned out to be a tense affair. No side really managed to create any clear chances. There was one heart stopping moment in the first period when a long range drop kick from Leicester nearly went over. Extra time yielded no further points and the game went into an historic penalty shoot out. Five kicks at goal from the 22 metre line in front of the posts. After 5 kicks it was 4 all and it went into a sudden death scenario. Martyn Williams missed a kick and it was left to Jordan Crane to slot one over to claim the win for Leicester. Incredible drama. Anyone who went to the game will never forgot those last 8 minutes in the game when Cardiff scored two tries.

On balance of play Leicester probably deserved the win but what a cruel way to lose.

My man of the match: Jamie Roberts.

Round-up

Munster 43-9 Ospreys. 12 April 2009. Munster coasted to an easy win in this Heineken Cup quarter final. There were at their best and the Ospreys were very disappointing. One to forget.

Blues 50-12 Gloucester. 18 April 2009. EDF Cup Final. The Blues were in superb form as they put Gloucester to the sword. The Cardiff back row were immense and the first try by Halfpenny was an absolute peach. One of the tries of the season. (see link for match highlights)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/7996656.stm

Ospreys 27-18 Dragons. 30 April 2009.

Army 50-7 Navy. 2 May 2009. An entertaining open game albeit a one sided affair. 50,000 crowd at Twickenham.

Leinster 25-6 Munster. 2 May 2009. Heineken Cup semi final. 82,00o people at Croke Park watched a pulsating game as Leinster turned the tables on tournament favourites Munster. The Leinster pack fronted up to the Munster eight and Rocky Elsom had a great game. BOD also played a blinder and his interception and sprint resulted in the try that ended the game for Munster.

Harlequins 0-17 London Irish. 9 May 2009. Premiership semi-final.

Munster 36-10 Ospreys. 15 May 2009. Magners League. Munster ran out comfortable winners to be crowned Magners League champions.

Blues 9 - 6 Toulouse. 11 April 2009

I went down to Cardiff to watch the Heineken Cup quarter final at the Millenium stadium. As usual we had a breakfast at Servinis to set us up for the day. We stumbled upon an old pub called The Vulcan not far from the city centre. Apparently it is the oldest pub in Cardiff and dates back to 1853. It's a bit on the basic side and makes the Rovers Return from Coronation Street look big. Sadly it is due to be demolished soon to make way for a multi storey car park. That's progress for you.

At Cardiff Rugby club visitors bar we met this crazy couple from Italy. They were Calvisano fans and also big Toulouse supporters. Long way to come to support the French team.

Next stop on the pub crawl was the Nos Da pub on the river. At the bar I noticed a lady with a Jamie Robinson testimonial rugby shirt on. I remarked to her that Jamie wasn't even the squad for today's match. It turned out that she was Jamie's mother, Jan Robinson. Spooky. We chatted about Jamie's move to Toulon next season and Nicky's move to Gloucester. Nice lady.

The game turned out to be a tense affair with no tries. Toulouse came the closest to scoring when Dustautoir crashed over the try line, though the replay showed he had knocked it on. The defence of both teams was immense and Blues prop Gethin Jenkins led the way as usual. Xavier Rush and Molitika were superb as well. All the Blues points came from Ben Blair and come the final whistle I think the home side deserved their victory. Not the greatest of games but a fine win.

After the game we had a few pints at Cardiff rugby and watched 4th Street Traffic as they played their usual set of Stereophonics covers. A real good day out.

My man of the match: Gethin.

Worcester 22-8 Saracens. 4 April 2009

Went to Worcester for the first time to watch this Guinness Premiership match. Sixways, the home of Worcester is easy to find; just turn off junction 6 on the M5 and you can't miss it. The ground is in a large industrial area and there are no pubs nearby. On the upside parking is plentiful on the many sideroads surrounding the ground. Don't bother paying the fee to park in the ground, park just outside, and its only a ten minute walk away. Sixways is a decent modern stadium and the new stand built at the start of this season cost about seven million pounds.
The game was pretty boring for the first half, not much sticks in the memory. Second half Worcester began to create more rugby and the try they scored was worthy of winning the game.

My man of the match: Sanderson