15/12/2007
Quintin 21 London French 19
Zut alors, sacreblue, merde - ze Quintin, zey are top of ze league.
After a close away game against French earlier in the season Quintin were looking forward to the rematch on home turf. In contrast with recent games against Northolt and GWR, we turned up at the ground early and went through a number of drills to get ourselves in the right frame of mind for this encounter. Quintin had a very strong team out, but would this be enough to defeat the previously unbeaten league leaders?
The game started at a furious pace, with Quintin camped in the French half. The French tackling and work at the breakdown was ferocious – whereas against lesser teams our ball carriers would get over the gain line, here we were being smashed back and turned over. After a few minutes of this we decided to take the points after a penalty was awarded and Sanger duly converted.
The next few minutes were very evenly balanced, but suddenly French intercepted Quintin ball on the half way line and their No. 8 ran in to score. Sanger was still wearing his offensive slip ons and was unable to catch up. As if this wasn’t bad enough French scored another breakaway try. We were now 3-14 down, and it was beginning to look like a long day at the office.
Our hearts were lifted shortly before the interval when Sanger managed to cross the line for a try but he was too far out to convert meaning that we went into the break 8-14 down.
We had a stern chat with ourselves at halftime, with people saying we needed to up the intensity as we weren’t even knackered (I was!). After the restart we spent some time in the French 22 and the French were starting to infringe more and more at the breakdown. We were awarded a penalty and Sanger slotted this to make it 11-14.
The French found themselves with a lineout on the Quintin 5 yard line and were able to catch (an alleged not straight ball) and power over for their third try of the day. We were now 11-19 down with about 20 minutes to play and even Sly Stallone would consider it implausible for Quintin to come back. But miracles do happen, and it came in the unlikely form of Smythe’s man bag. He was able to sprinkle some mascara into Shokoladenproppen’s eyes meaning that our Captain had to go off and Smythe was now in charge. The Q’s were fuming at the Captain’s abandonment and started running hard and straight at the French defence. As the French tired we were starting to break tackles, and shortly afterwards Andy Little crossed the line making it 16-19.
The French continued to infringe and found themselves down to 13 men. They say lightning never strikes twice, but with less than two minutes to go Quintin gave 100% and the forwards repeatedly drove at the line allowing Andy his second try of the day.
WE WON – 21 -19!!!!
If the game was full of drama, nothing could prepare us for what happened immediately after the game. Now I’ve seen lots of rugby related dummy spitting, examples including May Lee taking offence at enforced pelvic thrusting when chatting to a lady at Pickin’s 30th, and also Shokoladenproppen spitting the dummy when being forced to drink beer in Putney a few years ago. However, the French were the most unsportsmanlike players I think we have ever encountered. As soon as the whistle went there were punch ups. Hogg later claimed that he had seen one of the French players steal his precious potatoes. What is normally a good Alouette descended into a mumbling as the French had a collective Tourette outburst. We chose not to sing “A Frenchman went to the lavatory” in case it further ruined Anglo-French relations.
Quintin are now top of the league (although French have a game in hand). The third match of the season between the two teams will be a cracker!
Man of the Match: Everyone except Shokoladenproppen and Sanger
French ticklers of the Day:
Sanger: His slip ons let him down when it mattered most
Shokoladenproppen: Abandoned team in the heat of the battle