Moving on…
Leicester next week, and we’re going to have to buck up if we’re going to get anything out of that match.
I’m hoping for a response to that… Game? Farce? I know that Leicester will be on a high after beating Bath, but I still feel — and I know I may be clutching at straws here — that they’re beatable.
SAMP has it too close to call: recent history suggests a 24-22 win, but the longer-term trend says a 23-24 defeat. The noises coming from the club have been upbeat and bullish, so let’s see if they can make good. I’ll be watching from Smithy’s bar, hoping to follow it up with a second victory over the Tigers in one day.
OK, you want to know my thoughts on the Saracens game. For what it’s worth, here goes.
We. Are. Not. That. Bad.
For forty minutes, we had their measure. Then it fell apart.
I haven’t watched it again, so what follows is my impression from watching live.
I don’t see how anyone could decide that Caluori would have probably scored a try. Possibly, yes, probably, no. My memory is that at no time did he have control of the ball – it brushed his hands, yes, but he didn’t have a grip on it. No grip, no certainty of control, no probability that he would have touched it down, no penalty try.
Also, Buck and others should note that, apparently, you can now get a penalty by jumping forward into a defender when going for the ball…
As for the Dickie incident, I was shouting at the telly that it was shoulder to shoulder first, and that you couldn’t see clear head contact. Given the outcome of Tuesday evening’s hearing, I feel justified in that.
Yeah, and on that verdict, the report says something about submissions from both players. If – if – Willis testified that there had been no head contact, why didn’t he tell the referee at the time? Wouldn’t doing that be in line with our much-vaunted “rugby values”? Dickie insists that there was no head contact. If – if – Willis let it go on the day when he could have intervened, then he’s gone down in my estimation. “Rugby values”, remember? We’re better than footballers, I hear…
- Addendum: I’ve since heard that Willis did try to tell the referee. If so, I take all that back and, for the first time in one of these reports, I will call the referee a bloody idiot.
They didn’t replay the SiMac-Dan incident, so I didn’t really see what happened. It feels off to me, given that SiMac was knocked out, but I don’t have all the facts.
All in all, this was a freak game. Don’t read anything into it, because
We. Are. Not. That. Bad.
an old grey dog 