I was glad to get home, have a meal and watch The Voice on ITV
Saturday 14th January 2017: European Challenge Cup pool stage: Harlequins v Edinburgh Rugby at the Stoop, kick off 1500 hours: Harlequins 18 Edinburgh Rugby 23: (Edinburgh Rugby 4 points for a victory, now certain of reaching the quarter-finals; Harlequins 1 losing bonus point, now needing to win next weekend against Stade Francais in Paris to progress).
I honestly never thought I’d write this statement, but words almost fail me.
Edinburgh Rugby had previously prevailed in the 36-35 ECC clash between these two team in Edinburgh and for 72 of the 80 minutes of this match they were infinitely the superior team. From 1 to 15 they had arrived in the correct frame of mind, warmed up and ready to go about their business come what may. And duly did.
At five minutes to the final whistle, Edinburgh were leading 20-6 and not flattered a smidgeon by that score line – it could/should easily have been by another five or even ten points at that stage. After the usual snow storm of late-term replacements on both sides the game suddenly opened up and Quins somehow managed to score 12 points (two tries, one converted) in the last three minutes to give a false impression of the game. The hurly-burly finale could just as easily ended with Edinburgh scoring another 12 points, not Quins.
Oh, and Quins had three players (Kyle Sinckler, James Chisholm and Dave Ward) yellow-carded. Teams that play with 14 men for half an hour rarely come out on top in this sport.
This was one of the worst first team performances by a Quins team that I can ever remember. The sad aspect is that it was no more than many of us in my stand were expecting. Some members of the Quins management may point to our extensive and absentee injury list but we were fielding five England internationals in the starting XV and, to be frank, this performance was unworthy of the multi-coloured quartered shirt.
In passing I would like to absolve Mike Brown from any criticism. As ever, his uncompromising never-say-die attitude was a beacon of defiance and he must have been seething with inner rage at the insipid play going on around him.
It was symptomatic of the ‘dead’ atmosphere in the stands that the PA announcer’s regular pleas for the crowd to be its usual ‘16th man’ and the exhortations to sing The Mighty Quinn fell upon deaf ears to an extent that became embarrassing.
With ten minutes to go a steady stream of Quins supporters began filing out of the stands for an early walk or drive home in the freezing temperatures, fed up with watching any more of the rubbish they were being force-fed from the pitch.
It hurts me to say this but not only would prime Premiership relegation candidates Bristol Rugby and Worcester Warriors have put up a better fight in this game had they been playing in it, but so would have London Irish and whichever will be the three other Championship promotional candidates. Quins were woeful.
This season I have been going down to watch home matches at the Stoop purely for the ‘craic’ of seeing my mates and acquaintances. The place has completely lost its ‘mojo’.
Even the half-time entertainment has sunk to the level of a primary school church hall tombola. Yesterday the PA announcer did a rugby version of Bruce Forsythe’s Play Your Cards Right. Our hero had a nephew and uncle trying to guess whether the next Quins shirt number flashed up on the TV screen was going to be ‘higher or lower’ than its predecessor.
Excruciating from start to finish.
It would be better to mount no half-time entertainment at all than inflict crap like this on the paying punters.
They tried to make something of a statement and draw a line in the sand by getting rid of our ‘old school’ rugby PA announcer Mad Max with his irreverent quips and also the Columbinas cheerleading/dance troupe, but at least they ‘went for it’, had their tongues firmly in their cheeks and made you feel you belonged to a rugby club.
Peter Glaze
These days we Quins fans are ‘members’ not season ticket holders and are preached at (a ‘Please respect the kicker’ notice come up on the TV screen every time someone takes a kick at goal) as if we’re eight year olds in a Crackerjack audience in the late 1950s.
Yesterday, if he hadn’t sadly passed away in 1983, it wouldn’t have surprised me in the slightest if out onto the pitch they’d wheeled the great Peter Glaze in a wheelchair or perhaps a cardboard cut-out of him. They’d certainly have raised more enjoyment and laughs had they done so.
The management needs to get its collective head out of its backside and treat the Club like it’s a grown-up Premiership operation and not just some sort of second division Disneyland business like Thorpe Park or somewhere.
Forget everything they learned on their ‘sports/business management theory’ degree courses and start living and breathing rugby.
And if they’re unable or unwilling to do that, just hold their hands up and find jobs somewhere else.
If Quins continue to play like this I shall begin confining myself to watching the occasional match on television because I cannot take much more of what I’m being subjected to at the Stoop. I’ve got better things I can do with my Saturday afternoons.
And there isn’t a man jack sitting within a 20 metre radius of my seat in the stands thinking any different.
