Sub-18 Cup Run ...... Over

Sam Heger

Sub-18s lose narrowly to a fortune-blessed top flight Agronomia team to go out of the cup at the quarter final stage. View images from the game here and read Damian Steele's cri de coeur.

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Click here to view Peter Fay's images from the game: http://goo.gl/8akst

Match Report by Damian Steele

In the world of professional sport it is impossible for a coach or player to be brutally honest about their thoughts on match officials, as they will inevitably be required to forfeit a large amount of cash for voicing their opinions. While I don´t necessarily believe in muzzling people and taking away their right to free speech, this rule ensures the integrity of the game is upheld and prevents one eyed coaches from shifting the blame of match results from their teams deficiencies, and onto the officials who are ultimately doing the best job they can. Since St. Julian´s Rugby Club are not in the professional world of sport, I can safely fire the arrows of blame in whatever direction I want :-). Before going any further, it´s important to point out that the author of this article is also the coach of the Sub 18s, and is his own, and the team’s, harshest and most honest critic. The tone of this article is not a case of "sour grapes", and would have been the same regardless of the end result of the game.

April 27th, 2013, 10:30am, Portuguese Cup (aka "Poisoned Chalice") Quarter Final, St. Julian´s vs Agronomia. This will be forever entrenched in the minds of St. Julian´s Sub-18 players and supporters, as the time we were beaten by one man in an orange outfit and a whistle (with some minor assistance from some other guys in green and white striped jerseys). There was more corruption, deceit and lies in this 70 minutes of rugby than all five seasons of Prison Break put together. At the end of the match the score sheet read "St Julian´s 14 vs Agronomia 18", but the true influence on the match lies in the infringement count, "St Julian´s 826 (apparently) vs Agronomia 9 (5 of which were in the last two minutes when the referee attempted to make up for the worst decision since Portugal not settling Australia after discovering it in the 1700´s)".

The match started well for our Sub-18s, receiving the kick off and pushing up the field through a combination of phases close to the ruck and in the wider channels. Then there was some abuse from the sideline from opposition coaches, followed by the loud shrill of a whistle, and that was the beginning of the end....... In the ensuing 35 minutes a number of things became blatantly obvious, 1) St. Julian´s defence was virtually impenetrable, 2) As was the case last year in our quarter final match against Direito, there was only going to be one winner of this match and it was not going to be St. Julian´s, 3) The commitment and resolve of our current day Sub 18s is outstanding. We managed to hold our line intact for the first half, despite playing into a howling wind and copping wave after wave of attacks from Agronomia, on the back of wave after wave of dodgy penalty calls. The score was 6-0 to Agronomia at half time, but playing into a 14 point breeze, this was a great result for our boys.

The second half was punctuated by moments of great attacking sequences from St. Julian´s, some extremely costly errors on our behalf, and surprise suprise, a number of very questionable decisions by Mr Referee. The lead changed on multiple occasions as our boys continued to attack from all over the park, while Agronomia decided on the more direct route around the fringes of the ruck, while being piggy backed up the field by the man in orange. Two well-constructed tries to Tomás Reid and Tom Vilar were converted by Santiago Oriol, and left us with a 14-11 lead with 10 minutes to play.

With the wind at our backs and fire in our hearts, things were looking very good for us to enter a zone we´d never been before as a club......Portuguese Cup Semi Finals. However, a kick out on the full, followed by a ridiculous pass in our own 22m found us on our own line and defending for our lives once again.

By this stage, the boys were tiring and our tackle effectiveness dropping, as we´d spent the majority of the match defending and retreating 10 metres after the sickly sound of a high pitched whistle, but there was a wicked determination in the eyes of the boys to keep Agronomia out. Our players kept tackling and defended our line like Mr Ferris defends his pies, but it was never going to be enough.....The final scoring of the match was a try to an Agronomia player who ran straight into the back of his player, blocking two of our tacklers from getting him, and causing players from both teams to momentarily stop and wait for the monotonous shriek of the whistle (again) for the obvious obstruction.

Stevie Wonder was up in the music department and even he said he saw it, but the spine tingling shrill never came, and Agronomia would go on to record an 18-14 victory. Our boys tried valiantly to control their emotions and score in the final minutes, but the corruption had physically and emotionally fatigued them, and we were not able to find the required 5 pointer. References to poor refereeing are no doubt becoming boring reading by now, but it´s not half as boring as it was gut wrenching for the players who gave so much and received so little on Saturday morning. Our performance was far from perfect, and we certainly made some costly errors during the match, but that´s a part of any game, and unfortunately on this occasion, the punishment at the hands of the referee did not match crimes that we committed.

The positives of the day were plentiful. To see the boys completely outplay an opposition who smashed us by 40 points a mere 4 months ago was very pleasing. Watching our senior players attempt to take control and keep things on the right track in the face of extreme adversity - as mentioned, plus injuries and unavailability to key players - was also very good. The manner in which we played the game and scored our tries, despite some tactical and technical errors, was great to see. As was the commitment and determination of the boys, some of whom played completely out of position, to compete for the full 70 minutes to achieve the desired result. I was very proud of the effort of all the players, and upset for them because they deserved a lot more than what they got. It was sort of like seeing your best friend start dating your sister..... there´s positives and you are proud and happy for them, but it´s not exactly the outcome you´re after.

With our Cup dream now over, we take a break from matches as the boys focus on their studies, before turning our attention to hosting Montemor on the 19th of May to secure our place in the A League for next season.

Thank you to all the supporters who watched our match on Saturday, and congratulations to all the players for their mighty effort. The match against Montemor a few weeks back was one of the best, and most complete, performances I´ve seen from a St Julian´s team, but Saturday´s match against Agronomia is up there with the gutsiest and most resolute displays, and one that made me very proud to be associated with these young men.

Tries

Tomas Reid, Tom Vilar

Conversions

Santiago Oriol

Man of the Match

Sam Heger