By Prof
January 18 2006

This Saturday NEC Harlequins take on Newbury Blues at Monks Lane. Newbury were the first side to play at the new Twickenham Stoop way back in September, a day when the sun shone, the new Lexus Stand was opened and Nicky Duncombe’s memorial was unveiled. That day Quins ran out winners by 52 points to 13 although the final scoreline doesn’t tell the whole story, we went in at half time behind 10-13 with the Newbury try coming from good play by two ex-Quins, Chris Cracknell and Mark Ireland. Although Alex Rogers was the only payer who got a try for Quins in the first half the story was different in the second half with tries coming from Ian Vass, Charlie Amesbury, Simon Keogh, Mel Deane and two from Nick Easter. Quins played a simpler and more direct game in the second half and it paid off.

When Newbury were promoted last season many other ND1 teams thought they would struggle and be first choice for the relegation spot. Whether there will be relegation or not from ND1 this season is still being debated but Newbury are sitting pretty in mid table on equal points (32) with Nottingham and Exeter who are in 6th and 7th.

One thing about Newbury’s style of play is that they attack from everywhere and this ploy has been relatively successful with them having scored the fourth highest number of points (393), behind Cornish Pirates (461), Bedford Blues (470) and Quins (552). However if we look into the points against column of the table we see that while they attack well it tends to leave them vulnerable in defence, they have had more points scored against them (483) than anyone else (Sedgley Park are only one point better).

Looking at the individual games they have had this season we can see that they have played some good games at Monks Lane; they have beaten Exeter Chiefs, London Welsh, Nottingham, Otley, and Sedgley Park and Cornish Pirates only beat them by one point (25-26)! Their stand out result on the road has to be against Plymouth Albion who they beat 41-52 in a game where attack was certainly seen as being more important than defence.

Last week Newbury went down to Cornish Pirates 30-10 away from home but in that loss they still managed two tries, one by Chris Cracknell.

At The Twickenham Stoop NEC Harlequins put Otley to the sword, I think everyone who saw the game was disappointed that Otley seem to have decided to come to physically intimidate Quins rather than to play any rugby. The Quins players kept their discipline and did the job on the visitors running out winners by 43 points to 3.

The pitch is currently quite muddy and the heavy rain forecast locally for Friday will only make matters worse. The forecast on the day itself is perfect for rugby: sunny intervals, 8ºC (46°F) with a very light 2mph wind from the south. With both teams wanting to play expansive rugby we should see an exciting game with a lot of tries although the heaviness of the pitch may be a bit of a problem.

Surprisingly there were no injury problems from the bruising encounter with Otley last weekend and the team shows only one change in the starting lineup and three on the bench. Quins should have Andrew Mehrtens back at number 10 despite the good performance Adrian Jarvis put in last week and Ugo Monye should also return from injury to gain a place on the bench. Squad rotation sees Mark Lambert replace Lorne Ward on the bench.

Last week the forwards wanted to make their mark on the Otley pack and they certainly did, this week we may see a more expansive game plan and with old heads like Mehrtens and Greenwood to control the game and the out and out speed of Keogh, Brown and Amesbury we should expect some exciting back play. The return of Ugo Monye is great to see, I’m sure he’d like to get the chance to add to his tries this season after quite a few weeks out injured. Chris Cracknell and Isoa Damudamu (both ex-Quins) have 8 and 7 tries respectively this season so they are very close to the three top try scorers for Quins Ugo Monye (10), Simon Keogh (9) and Nick Easter (8).

Whatever happens it should certainly be an exciting spectacle.

If Quins win, as their league position and previous game against Newbury would suggest, then it is unlikely that they will increase their lead at the top of the table. Bedford Blues have what should be a relatively easy trip up to Sedgley Park but the Cornish Pirates have what could be quite a tricky trip up to Rotherham.

Come on you Quins!

Newbury Blues possibly:
Roberts; Baxter, Ireland, Bell, Bingham, Feeney, Smaje, Carter, Scothern, A. Jarvis, Hart, Radbourne, Styles, Cracknell, Damudamu.
Replacements: Nutt; Aiono, Rogers, Faulkner, Jones, Dalgleish, A. Smith.

NEC Harlequins expected to be:
Mike Brown, Charlie Amesbury, Will Greenwood, Gavin Duffy, Simon Keogh, Andrew Mehrtens, Steve So’oialo, Ceri Jones, Tani Fuga, Ricky Nebbett, Jim Evans, Simon Miall, Chris Robshaw, Andre Vos, Nick Easter
Replacements: Jimmy Richards, Mark Lambert, Pablo Bouza, Tom Guest, Adrian Jarvis, Mel Deane, Ugo Monye

Referee: Sean Davey
Touch Judges: Rowan Kitt & Kevin Stewart
Assessor: David Warren

PS Remember you can see some of the Academy players who are involved this weekend at the Meet the Academy Evening on 31st January at The Stoop.