Irish -v- Bath

By Glen Leat
March 21 2004

Bath won the first double header game with London Irish 20-21 after their forwards grabbed the game by the scruff of the neck as the Bath backs did everything in their power to hand a victory to the home side. Excepting Chris Malone, Bath's backs embarrassed themselves on more than one occasion.

The record breaking 22,840 crowd and amazing Irish organisation turned this game from a League match in to a Cup Final: it was truly amazing and I left the ground buzzing with the sort of excitement normally reserved for successful days out at Twickenham. The noise was deafening, at times I felt like I was watching the game in a pub: I could see the match but I couldn't hear it because my senses were swamped by the cacophony all around - fantastic. Oh and by the way, the game provided great excitement as well. There may have been loads of mistakes by both sides but the Bath forwards played some moves that nearly made me weep with pleasure and we never knew who would win right up until the final kick of the game - wonderful, just how sport should be!

At the end of the game I found myself near the pitch waving to our players like a child in awe of his heroes and shouting at the top of my voice. But it wasn't just the game, the players, the win, it was the atmosphere created by the Irish crowd - their wigs, their hats, their songs - I normally hate all of this but this time it was wonderful. Thank you London Irish, thank you Madejski Stadium (which is a great place to watch rugby), thank you Bath forwards (and Chris Malone) I love you all!!

Right that's enough of that, back to normal now...

It took some time for the crowd noise to subside after the start of the game and both teams kept the game even for the first nine minutes when Bath contrived to totally cock-up a line-out just outside their twenty-two. A long throw from stand-in skipper, Jonathan Humphreys, sailed well over the heads of all the forwards and the home side were quickest to the breakdown, scooping the ball to their back-line to give Paul Sackey a run at Wylie Human and recent recruit Paul Sampson. Looking back I doubt if Sackey will believe his luck as both Human and Sampson gave impressions of two men who have just discovered the game of rugby and weren't told they had to stop the bloke running at them! Describing their attempts at tackling as pathetic does an injustice to the use of the word "pathetic": Fred Karno would have signed them on the spot if he'd seen this.

Whilst things did get (slightly) better for the Bath backs it seemed that only Alex Crockett understood the rudiments of tackling an opposing player and this poor area of play ensured London Irish stayed in the game right until the final whistle. Alright so this was not our first choice back-line however, with the exception of Spencer Davey, this was not a team of rookies and they will be very disappointed that their actions almost gifted London Irish a win and Wasps an opportunity to knock us off our perch.

Chris Malone's kicking was superb all afternoon in very windy conditions and he was a very able deputy for England's latest golden boy, Olly Barkley. The distances Malone achieved on numerous occasions ensured that Bath gained 40, 50 and even 60 yards up-field. I was also impressed with his work-rate and tackling: on one occasion he hoofed the ball 30 yards ahead, chased and tackled, jumped to his feet and smuggled the ball back on the Bath side of the gain line - great play. This lad has improved leaps and bounds this season and I say "fair play mate" you've proved many of us wrong when we were happy to see you loaned out to the Brizzlers last September.

After 22 minutes Irish scrum half, Darren Edwards, was binned for messing around at the Bath scrum and amazingly his opposite number, Martyn Wood, was binned later on for body checking Mark Mapletoft. My view on these sins is that Tony Spreadbury was too harsh on both occasions. I don't remember him previously warning Edwards about his conduct and Wood just stood his ground after "Tofty" chipped and sought out a Bath player to run at - he sold the referee a dummy and the ref bought it! As a result of the Edwards penalty Chris Malone scored the first points for Bath.

Seven minutes later Bath scored their first try from a line-out and rolling maul with Duncan Bell scoring and giving the visitors the lead. This score almost silenced the home crowd and gave them a warning that their forwards were in for a lesson in driving play: however the major lesson was still to come. Two Mapletoft penalties (one from the binning of Martyn Wood) and another from the boot of Chris Malone right at the death made the score 11-11 at half-time.

With Martyn Wood off the field for the first five minutes of the second half Michael Lipman took his place at the scrums, unfortunately on both occasions Lipman realised that there is more to this art than just chucking the ball at the front row. The first scrum was lost and the second resulted in a penalty to Irish from which they re-took the lead.

However all of this was soon forgotten as Bath pulled out the play of the season. With ball safely secured at a line-out on the Irish twenty-two the forwards rolled and drove a full 20 metres in solid formation for Lee Mears to score. It was as if the previous try had been a practice run for this magnificent display of the art of forwards play. This passage of play was 30 seconds of "rugby sex", it was a quality claret called sport, it was that moment in the "zone" when everything clicked, it was a thing of beauty and it was "ours"! Eight men driving in unison, no tractor and trailer errors: Michael Foley's words of wisdom ringing in their ears as they marched in hunched formation like a troop of soldiers towards the enemy line. Forget the 80 yard run-ins and the intricate plays resulting in a flashy score, this was the "real thing" - brilliant! Thank you Bath Pack for providing my sporting moment of the last 12 months - this beat that kick in the World Cup Final for me.

Almost 20 minutes later London Irish drew within a point of Bath after Mapletoft's replacement, Barry Everitt, slotted home his first penalty. He missed another a few minutes later and then Chris Malone completed his day with a brilliant 40 metre drop goal which seemed to hang in the air for hours. Referee, Spreadbury, also took an age to raise his arm but when he did the Bath fans went wild - victory was in sight.

However this game was a long way from inviting the fat lady on stage to start singing. Everitt scored another penalty to narrow the margin to one point again. The Bath forwards took up the challenge of closing the game down with some very tight play but suddenly the ball bounced out and the Irish backs were charging up-field. The Bath defenders tried once, twice, three times to kick the ball in to touch so Spreadbury could blow his whistle to end the game but they just couldn't get the ball in to the crowd. Suddenly the home side found themselves out wide in the Bath twenty-two and up stepped Barry Everitt to win the game with a drop goal. The ball was struck sweetly and we all watched with sagging jaws as it headed for the posts. End over end, getting ever closer. Would we be denied victory at the death? No, the balled swerved to the right and shaved the outside of the right-hand upright, the whistle blew and arms flew skywards both on the field and on the terraces as Bath had secured a massive and vital victory. Phew, what a game, what a day, what a victory.

All ready for the return match next week?

Let's have a look at the latest league table.

Scorers

London Irish: Horak; Sackey, Appleford, Hoadley, Bishop; Mapletoft, Edwards; Hatley, Drotske, Hardwick, Strudwick (capt), Casey, Danaher, Dawson, Sheasby.
Replacements: Wheatley, Flavin, Roche, Kennedy, Murphy, Barrett, Everitt.

Bath: Sampson, Crockett, Higgins, Davey, Human, Malone, Wood, Flatman, Humphreys (capt), Bell, Fidler, Hudson, Beattie, Lipman, Fea'unati.
Replacements: Martens, Mears, Stevens, Blake, Barnes, Scaysbrook, Gray.

Referee: Tony Spreadbury