A Wanderers warm-up that would have done justice to a Foreign Legion Selection Test

Skerries 1st XV v Wanderers, 30th November, 2002 at Lansdowne Road

Wanderers 46
Skerries 12

Those who went early to headquarters on Saturday witnessed a Wanderers warm-up that would have done justice to a Foreign Legion Selection Test. All that expenditure of ardour and adrenalin in the prologue would surely have a serious repercussion on the match-play. Lactic acid would get the chaps in the end, wise Holmpatrick heads predicted. Well, Wanderers clocked up 22 unanswered points in 50 minutes without any apparent physical depreciation. But when Skerries then moved centre stage to confect two first-class tries the sages saw their forecast taking shape. Disintegration was nigh for the blue black and white. This was thinking too heavily inspired by wish. In the event Wanderers weathered the freak storm and came back to double their account in the last quarter hour, finishing fresh as the proverbial daisies. The moral of the story is that a team doesn’t tire when it is imposing pressure. Fatigue only sets in when when a team is chronically absorbing pressure. The question of why Wanderers took the dominant position on Saturday, leaving the thankless mop-up role to the Goats, is one that requires a brief technical digression.

The laws of rugby union football and current on-the-field interpretation of them greatly favour ball conservation. A small example: a tackle is made and the ball-carrier places the ball in the direction of his own team (a relatively recent indulgence). First on the scene is a defender. As he reaches for the ball that would reward his mobility he is swept into oblivion by two members of the attackers Panzer division. In the ensuing ‘tidying-up’ operation two more attackers glide past the ball the conveniently curtail the vision and movement of the defence, thus ensuring that the subsequent thrust is carried out in circumstances most favourable to the ball carriers. And this cocktail of obstruction and offside takes place with the benediction of a referee who tootles his flute at the merest suspicion of a knock on! Ball conservation has obvious official backing. But in order to keep the ball you must first get hold of it. It was in the area of primary possession that Skerries were deficient on Saturday. If the scrums were admirably solid, the restarts were too often conceded and the line-outs verged on the shambolic.

Given this background Skerries did well to be only 15 points adrift at the break. Tenacious tackling and the fallibility of their place kicker Bowen restricted the home yield to two tries, a conversion and a penalty. Both tries could trace their lineage to a superbly marshalled rolling maul - a potent reminder of the continuing value of that underused art.

When Wanderers began the second half in similar vein and decorated their score with a further converted try the portents were poor for Skerries. But quite suddenly the seasiders reversed the trend. A feature of their first-half play had been their willingness to spread the ball even with short rations. Now with a protracted lease they began at last to threaten. KEANE D on the left wing did wonderfully well to hold a pass that was rifled at a point above his head. He did even better to ward off a pair of defenders and sprint to the corner for an inspirational score. GRIMES impresses at all times with his industry around the field and now he comfortably took a covering catch outside his own 22, hoisted a kick to the other end and made prodigious ground to block the attempted clearance. The Goats won possession at the line-out and CONNOLLY took an excellent score in the right corner. KEANE C kicked the conversion.

The travelling support was now in full voice as the game throbbed with uncertainty. But the one time aristocrats of Irish rugby gradually reasserted their authority…. and their ownership of the ball. Their backs performed some pleasant arabesques which netted them three converted tries and transformed the scoreboard into a miscarriage of justice. Skerries deserved more from their afternoon’s work and their performance overall was light years away from the somnambulism of the opening two matches. In this season’s Skerries match programme Mickey Machiavelli, Wanderers version of the Eternal Flame, reminisces on taking a star-studded fifteen to play a League match at Holmpatrick a quarter of a century ago, only to be devoured by a near-feral local pack backed by the cultured boot of Celsus Toye. Any residual resentment from that occasion is likely to have been dissipated by Saturday’s events.