Where did it all go right?

Skerries 1st XV v Corinthians - 8th February, 2003 at Holmpatrick.

Skerries 18
Corinthians 13

The Rugby Committee went into emergency session shortly after the final whistle at Holmpatrick on Saturday. Events on the field were parsed and analysed and then reparsed. The general consensus was that an answer would have to be found to the serious conundrum posed by the Goats’ performance that afternoon. Debate raged on and it was well into the Sabbath before defeat was finally conceded. No-one, it seemed, could adequately resolve the question at issue: “Where did it all go right?” It’s not easy to explain how a squad which for so long this season has looked like a random collection of journeymen can, all of a sudden, take on the appearance of a three-star, cast-iron rugby team with both substance and soul. The rousing reception accorded to the players as they filed off the pitch was lacking only the ticker-tape and the open-top bus and the Goats rightly revelled in the warmth of the acclaim. So here is an announcement for intending passengers on the next famine boat out of Ireland. Benny and Derek, did anyone tell you there’d be days like this? You won’t find anything more rewarding on the far side of the Atlantic. You won’t find anything greener on a far-off antipodean hill. Don’t go lads.

Corinthians came to Fingal with impressive credentials – a letter from St. Paul and only a single defeat in AIL encounters this season. The seriousness of their intent was borne out by their beach routines on the South Strand on Saturday morning and by a frenetic on-the-pitch work-out before kick-off. But well before the long whistle they had shown signs of fatigue in the face of concerted local resistance. Maybe the burden of marching for Connaught is taking its inevitable toll.

Skerries made a tentative start. LAWLESS had been plucked out of retirement at the eleventh hour to deal with a crisis at wing-threequarter and as the first ball was hoisted into his territory you could see him resolving to remain strictly incommunicado on future Saturday mornings. But, consummate footballer that he is, he stood firm under the menace and the ball was cleared. The Goats were under tangible pressure in this opening period and it needed an emphatic tackle from CARAHER to cancel a Corinthian surplus on the outside. The visitors did take the lead with a penalty from full-back MORRISON but that advantage was soon nullified by a similar effort from home No. 10 KEANE.

The game had its defining moment on the quarter hour. Skerries retained possession at drop-out and BUTLER the open-side made a trade-mark thrust out of defence. When he reached the congestion he saw the ball back expeditiously to DUFF and the scrum-half fed the KEANE combo on the blind side, with C purveying to D on the very edge of the playing area. The idea of a score was chimerical at this point but the winger stowed the ball under his left oxter and set off to see what he could do. If KEANE was a dog he would be a Rottweiler and his hand-offs are invariably accompanied by a snarl. Three times in a row, without deviating from the touchline, he repelled defenders, as the crowed raised its decibels to salute each success, very much in the manner of olés at a corrida. Corinthians eventually ran out of fodder and the former flanker went on to score a try of incalculable value.

KEANE has been a veritable bête noire of every defence he has measured himself against this season and the visitors were visibly stung by this reverse. They continued, however, with their act of faith in the rolling maul but their reward was in territorial gain only – their own peccable place-kicking, allied to some admirable recalcitrance from the Skerries defence, precluded any more tangible deserts.

Skerries began the second period with rare authority and there was purpose and pace in the winning of a line-out in the club-house corner. GREY had to reach down rather than up to secure the catch but the Goats powered their way to the line and BUTLER was given the score. When KEANE C converted a win for the outsiders became a distinct possibility. An enormous pass in midfield skipped Derek the Decoy and gave LAWLESS breathing space on the outside but the winger discovered that he had sacrificed some sharpness to the sedentary life and the chance was lost. GILES galloped from a maul like a runaway Clydesdale before WALSHE’s binning obliged the Goats to throttle back.

When Corinthians exploited their numerical superiority to obtain a penalty try from a five yard scrum the game was on in earnest. MORRISON’S conversion left only 5 points between the teams with 19 minutes to play. Skerries response was made up of pride and obstinacy. There was one hallucinatory moment when, after play had moved on a good 20 metres, DUFF was left behind astride an opponent in what might be termed the missionary position. But saving bodies rather than souls seemed to be the issue. KEANE, C gave the goats a lifeline with another penalty but MORRISON replied in kind. And it was MORRISON who made a late infiltration which threatened to turn the match on its head before the captain EARLY effectively dismantled him with a tackle. In the context of an immense team performance a man-of-the-match award is invidious but the kudos this time went to the rapidly burgeoning back-five forward O’SHEA.

And what of the dreaded unforced errors? Is it churlish to suggest that a lot of kicking out of defence was purposeless? There were times in the first half when it might have been better to make a formal presentation of the ball to the opposition and claim tax relief on charitable bequests.