Skerries 1st XV v Greystones, 3rd January, 2004 at Holmpatrick

Skerries 17
Greystones 38

The claim was recently made on television that the video camera has done a serious disservice to the game of rugby. Club pundits, it was alleged, are now working long into the night probing the skills of prospective adversaries on film and devising even more refined means of suffocating them in an eventual encounter. Well, adoption of such a patently negative and hide-bound approach is not a charge that can be levied against the Goats. The concession of 182 points in 8 games confirms that magnanimity is their middle name and that freedom of the park is something that they like to share with others. Indeed there were times in the second half on Saturday when their only defensive strategy appeared to be a touching belief in the mercy of God.

A cavalier attitude to defence against the Wicklowemen was always likely to result in an exorbitant bill. Skerries and Greystones it will be recalled were the last two teams to be invited to play senior rugby, as opposed to earning the right to do so in competition. At that time, in the seventies, the former incarnated the pragmatic virtues of provincial rugby while the latter had inherited the more fluid habits of the metropolitan game. In direct confrontation the contrast was often stark. Both had their glory days. In time Skerries learned to rely less on a dominant pack but Greystones (despite flitting up and down amongst the three divisions in recent seasons) continued their subscription to sleight of hand and expansiveness and four of the better known alumni of their back line – Murphy, McNaughton, Doyle, Robbie – have graced the international stage. The current side was known to be operating within this tradition, accumulating more than 80 points against a hapless Ballina and stockpiling by far the highest aggregate in the entire AIL League.

Yet for 20 minutes on Saturday, corralled into their own half, they looked anything but serene and it is tenable to suggest that, on the day, their confidence came to them courtesy of a piece of dilatory defending by the home side. On their lone excursion to the sea-end in the first quarter Greystones had kicked a penalty. On their next visit fallible handling stalled a promising attack. It was a singularly inopportune moment for defenders to take mental leave of absence – the stray ball was kicked through and O’CONNELL won the race to the touch-down. The visitors struck again before the interval. Despite an eviscerating tackle by EARLY on O’BRIEN the ball catapulted to McNAUGHTON – that name again – who scored half-way out from the posts. SMITH converted both tries. Skerries during their period of ascendancy had never seriously threatened the try-line – too often the ball was given the status of an unwanted Christmas gift – but No. 10 SHEERAN did kick a penalty on 25 minutes, leaving a score of 17-3 at the break.

Now, a deficit of 14 points is invariably a Pavlovian trigger for the Goats to go into meltdown. Finishing within seven is, for them, a tantalus which would only leave them wracked by misgivings. When it is a question of losing, the habit of Lord Holmpatrick’s men is to do it in style. The large home support, florid and flatulent in the wake of festive excess, felt at this point that a break with custom was unlikely.

Tries are the aqua vitae of the ball-handlers and the Hoops spent the remainder of the match under the influence of their two first-half awards. There was definite whiff of intoxication about the manner in which they mounted their attacks from improbable origins and so often contrived to have a supernumerary beyond the ultimate tackler. Three further tries from O’CONNELL, SMITH and full-back CONNOLLY, all converted by SMITH, constituted a just desert.

But the bearers of the old gold cerise and blue never quite went running in self-submission to the Caudine Forks. A modicum of Kiwi granite went into the construction of this outfit and there was some admirably obdurate resistance, notably from EARLY and from forwards ENNIS, O’SHEA, O’NEILL and O’SULLIVAN. They even managed a minor intifada late in the game but it was significant that the two tries it yielded were products of individual vision rather than cohesive team effort. First, the zany O’SULLIVAN David showed that he is still a transcendent rugby talent by easing into a defensive fissure and pulling away from the pursuit before eliminating the full-back with the daintiest of soft-shoe shuffles. Then the ever vigilant DUFF kicked through and mastered the caprice of the oval all the way to the line. O’NEILL’s twin conversions helped in a revamping of the scoreline.

So what does all of this mean? Will Skerries continue to flounder against teams in the upper echelon? At the end the furrowed brow of BRASSINGTON seemed to be an index of such concern and the players were almost certainly destined to come under his critical cosh on their return to the dressing-rooms. On the other hand it may simply be the case that Christmas is celebrated with more genuine gusto north of the Liffey.

If on-the-field performances were flawed on Saturday there were some outstanding examples of administrative versatility. The incumbent junior Vice-President manned the turnstiles before kick-off. After the game he was seen deftly dodging the traffic as he worked to repatriate the no-parking cones. It wouldn’t have been a surprise to learn that he had spent the morning mixing cement on the building site before going on to clip the players’ toe-nails. Aspirants to the highest office in the club should know that the apprenticeship is long and laborious.