Well there’s nothing to raise the spirits after a rugby free Christmas than the prospect of a sodden gloomy trek down to Limerick for the commencement of the second half of the UBL.
For the life of me I cannot understand why the IRFU flipped the fixtures rather than simply reverse them. The latter would have had us travelling to UCD (And Garryowen travelling to Ballynahinch) which would have been as great a task, but would have been closer for the supporters and the players would have had an opportunity to play in a club that has a working lawnmower to cut the grass on the pitch.
Frankly, I haven’t seen a pitch with such long grass since I played in St Pauls as an under 10; and that was because the Vinnie’s were hoping to lose some pupils for ever. Underfoot (The foot long grass) it was also soggy (impossible to cut) so the day was going to be dominated by defending and given their last experience of Tarf on the G4 in Dublin, Garryowen had obviously worked solidly on that for the Christmas period.
The result was slow, slow, and slower. With the light blues bursting off the line, or the line a yard in front of the line, with diligent enthusiasm. Clontarf were like the Irish Guards in WW1, caught walking along in no man’s land and cut down by the gleeful defence. Throw in a ref who watched only the attacking side and we had a game that was going to be won by one score from a mistake. Despite that we did manage to engineer two serious breaks in the first half. Unfortunately both were undone by the pitch with both Conor O’Brien and Mick McGrath odds on to score in a one on one only to inexplicably lose their footing as they attempted to skirt the last defender. For those who were not there, picture playing on soft sand on Dollymount, wearing wellingtons. Place kicking was a lottery as tees sank without trace into the rough and long kicks died as if landing on a quilt. A lash of a sand wedge might have been a better course of action. But whatever about getting the ball off the ground, accuracy was a lottery. Both successful penalties on the day were converted from directly in front of the posts.
The game was ultimately decided in a passage of play at the beginning of the last quarter which had Tarf attacking on the edge of the home 22, failing to clear a ruck resulting in a penalty to the home side and shortly after the lineout, a couple of phases, a bad scrag tackle , an offload from the Garryowen 8 and their winger scored under the posts. They followed up with a penalty after Tarf saw yellow for a high tackle to bring the final score to 10 3. So a long drive for a game reminiscent of the 70’s.
Next up are Lansdowne in Castle Avenue. Let the season recommence !!