A-men; Revival Continues

Since way back in early January, it was abundantly clear that things were going to change in 2010. The training regime was grim but the application lit up the night sky out in the BSB. We had a bunch of player’s intent on bettering themselves this year.

With the A team on the brink of orchestrating the collapse of Den Haag on Saturday, Johnny O and Crusher were sprung from the bench. Within moments, their impact was telling. Johnny kicked a point whilst a series of raids from Crusher yielded at least one point but more importantly drained the energy from the legs of our opponents.

I heard a player from outside of Benelux commented to a mutual friend last week that he heard we were not fit. Those who had to face down the strong running of Diarmuid, the relentless persistence of Olof and the industry of Big Jim last Saturday will surely beg to differ. And they did later that night. When we meet that player later in the year, we will be in even better physical condition.

We put in a couple of gruesome enough sessions in La Rasante in the Mondays leading up to last weekend. There is a lot of hurt lingering in the hangover of 2009 and hard graft is the tonic lads have turned to.

Finally we are getting some settled feel to the team with myself, debutant Paul Gavin, Hudson, Crusher, Burkey and at times David Collins vying for just 4 starting slots in defence. Johnny O and Enda provide the energy and experience in midfield whilst Olof has made a successful transition back to wing forward. A second debutant lined up on the other wing on Saturday in the form of Diarmuid Laffan, a man of significant rugby pedigree and with a turn of pace and direct style which is perfectly suited to our game.

Remarkably Eoin has found an accomplice who can bring the best out of his game in the form of Jim. With Cluxton and Timmy doing a bit of a rotation between the sticks we had plenty of scope to rotate the squad and keep things fresh at the weekend. Enough scope to keep key man James O’Dowd in reserve until the final.

Having beaten An Bhelig, Lux and Amsterdam, we found ourselves with familiar opposition in the final. A realisation that things were getting a little out of hand in recent games was evident in the opening exchanges but as the minutes past, the intensity started to creep up a few notches.

It was tight throughout the first half and our slender one point margin at the internal was not much to rest our laurels on. There was more in us though and with some superb fielding from Diarmuid, we started to drive things on and never looked back after the resumption. Eoin kicked four points from play in the final and Jim, Johnny O, James and Diarmuid also contributed by raising the white flag.

The expected shemozzle would come with the game already decided. There was a bit of a ruck up in our forwards and the result this time round was Olof getting a haymaker into the nose. The offender promptly received his marching orders and we were able to close the game out. Our discipline in recent meetings has been excellent with no red card (as opposed to Den Hague’s two) and a miserly amount of yellows.

Our rivals are facing a familiar struggle. To win a European Championship takes a massive effort and lads must sacrifice holidays, weddings and all sorts of other things to be available for the fight. If you can get them together one year, you have a chance. To do it two in a row is nearly impossible. We’ve been there and felt the pain and bounced back. I’ve no doubt Den Hague’s dip is only temporary and we’ll see them back to their best soon.