BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES LV= AWC Cup Ospreys v Saints
By Saint Dom
November 7 2009
Imagine, please, my delight when I saw the LV Cup fixture list: Ospreys v Saints on 5 November - my birthday. I cooked up a deal to manoeuvre my way to Wild West Wales and celebrate the day with my dearest Welsh friends (Osprey aficionados, needless to say) and slot in some golf at Royal Porthcawl as well!
LV= AWC Cup Round 1 OSPREYS
v
Northampton Saints
Driving down, I pit-stopped at Membury Services on the M4 and encountered the benign gaze of "Uncle" Keith Barwell, also on his way west. A good omen, I thought.
At the Liberty Stadium I began to appreciate the "Hairsprays" tag when I clocked - wedged between the ticket office and the main entrance - a large, glossy Hairdressers, clearly not provided just for the Gavin Hensons of that parish.
I'm not quite sure how it happened but, thanks to the intervention of a former British Lion and Welsh international, we were ushered into the swish sponsors' lounge of the Liberty Stadium, and shown to the best seats in the house. The attendance, we learned later, was 4322, which meant something in the region of 20,000 unoccupied seats. Opposite, in the facing stand, I could make out the letters S-W-A-S-E-A. The N was partly obscured because some of the seats were occupied but, you get the picture: the splendid stadium was barely populated. I counted 4 other Saints supporters...
Kick-off. After 10 seconds, Mr Jones the ref whistled for the first time and awarded a penalty against Hopley for holding on (the ball having descended barely a nano-second earlier). "The runaway train ran down the hill and it blew... and blew... and blew!"
That was pretty much the story of the game. Saints and Ospreys stuttered and muttered ("That'll be 10 metres more", said Sir) and the penalty kicks flew thick and fast, some even slotting between the posts.
Before long, Saints were leading 13-0, after a slick break by England returnee Foden, from which Cannon cutely capitalised, and a penalty from Smyler. Jerry Collins shone for the Hairsprays, as did the hard-boiled egg lookalike, Steve Tandy at openside. Ian Gough was injured and staggered off, leaving the Welsh Junior Academy holding the fort against mostly the Wanderers.
Best to draw a veil over the rest of the match. Ospreys share the stadium with a soccer team known as the Swans, the pitch was magnificent and the locals friendly and welcoming. And they sported a magnificent brass band who lit up the interruptions (caused by the whistler and many injuries), with jaunty renditions of Delilah, Yellow Submarine and Bread of Heaven.
Highlights? Cannon picking of Foden's pass to score Saints only touchdown and his debut try. 14 points from Smyler's boot.
And the fireworks, in the sky. Not on the pitch!
Oh - and the golf was stormed off...
Ospreys 17 - Saints 19
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Benjamin Franklin
Tetleys Block F E143
Bridesmaids no more.
I was pleased to note that their supporters are just as one-eyed as we are.As for the stadium I have never known so much leg room it was brilliant and my position in the upper tier meant I could see everything but so could those at the pitchside because I tested that out before I realised I could upgrade for nothing.
I thought we were going to win by a country mile at one time but the welshmen came out of their shells after half time and made more of a spectacle of it.
Long drive home though!
No alcohol for January. I'm a dryathlete in aid of cancer research.
Dryathlon
The tone was set from the start when Mr Jones, the red-shirted whistler, pinged us for holding on. Blooming 'eck, I was still holding onto the side of my seat as I lowered my immense bulk.
The referee seemed blissfully unaware of the offside laws, and obstructions a-plenty, players taken out off the ball, missed endless knocks-on (though the touch judge was more on the ball) and was intermittently, inconsistently fussy about front-row antics. Vickers was yellow-carded for (cue: yanking arm) at the scrummage, but opposition transgressions ignored.
Ospreys dropped and fumbled a lot of good ball, but so did we. They shoved us over for their first try and repeatedly made inroads down the blindside in the second half, which gave Ospreys their second try.
Flash demonstrated that he's still not quite the finished article when, fielding a kick with loads of time, hoofed it heavenwards and straight back to the Ospreys instead of finding touch.
Dickens overdid the boxkicking, which conceded too much possession, but with a No 10 named Garry Owen, Ospreys returned the favour...
My Welsh golfing partners, who don't see a lot of rugby, found it physical, and alarmingly attritional. "Carnage" was the word my friend Pete chose to sum up the night's work.
Saints had lost one in 10 of available players
Ospreys more like one in 30 of available players
David L
What if there were no hypothetical questions?
- Live wrong and preposterously
Official word from the ticket office was that there were around seventy Saints supporters who'd bought tickets from us and them. We couldn't quite work out why they didn't squeeze everyone up, but ho hum, we managed to get Mathew in for three quid and James Cannon scored right in front of us in the corner - now if the (insert appropriate word) PC will ever let us download photos again I'll stick a copy up of a very happy young man having scored his first top level try.
The referee actually evened the game up, because at one point it could have been messy in our favour. To steal a line from my programme piece next week "if you cut below the star level there isn't a lot of strength in depth". Ironically, given the other results this weekend, what seemed to be the weakest set of teams may prosper through playing even weaker opposition (like Tiger Extra Extras).
If Thursday didn't tick all of the boxes, then Friday night at Aberavon certainly did - if you didn't want the boxes to be washed away.