Things can only get better…

Well here we go, first game of the season and this will equal my league attendances of last season. Lucky Garforth shirt – check, Tigers fleece, check – Tickets, check, walk under ladder on way to car – check, run over 13 black cats on way to station, check – shoot long winged wandering bird Diomedea epomophora, check. What could possibly go wrong?

A swift couple of beers in the Royal Oak and very nice the Holts beer was too. Off to ground to find the seats we had been sold were unavailable and we were relocated to some that were if anything even better. Sat amongst some rather peculiar Sale fans, peculiar in the fact that they seemed to be capable of not only understanding the laws of the game and its finer points but also had binocular vision sufficient to spot refereeing mistakes even when made in Sale’s favour.

Most of the Sale fans think that they are in for a right tupping, particularly up front, being a wiley old git, I say nothing, I have been to Edgeley Park and seen us lose far too many times to start counting chickens. Good to see Jason Robinson again on the pitch in the warm up.

The game kicks off and Leicester are pretty soon showing some forward dominance, two driving mauls take us up to within 5 metres or so of the Sale line albeit slowly, the second greeted by “is that all you can do” from the crowd. We then proceed to set the trend for the game and either kick it away, badly, knock it on, get turned over or otherwise conspire not to pose a real threat to Sale.

At a ruck, Gaskell presumably playing to orders hit Youngs from a blatantly offside position, I presume in an attempt to intimidate the youngster (Gaskell is 19 too!). Mr Rose immediately blew up but rather than take the penalty we responded to the provocation and the penalty was reversed. One up to Sale. Sale’s lineout is a shambles the first 2 are well overthrown and for the rest of the game it is pretty awful. Interestingly they are playing 2 hookers, one at 2 and one at 7, it is Briggs at 7 who throws, goodness only knows what the other guy’s throwing must be like. I’ll admit a bit of bias here in that Sale’s no. 6 was a product of my now local club Sandbach, he appeared very much to be the only lineout option although why that would be with Jones in there too mystifies me.

Briggs did a very good job as 7 and tidied up a lot of rubbish at the front of the lineout, perhaps it is his Rab C Nesbit headband but I certainly noticed him a lot whereas Woods was invisible to me at least. So to the first scrum, lips licked in anticipation, we get shunted back on the tighthead, fortunately it is reset, we get shunted back and Castro pops up, this was not in the script! Penalty to Sale. Second scrum goes pretty much the same way until I realise that Mr Rose is teasing me with his arm directions and it really is a penalty to us. Sale are playing as a team and although I haven’t seen much of them, with the exception of the estimable Lobbe and White, I suspect they might be stronger for losing some of their “names”.

For the first 10 minutes Sale looks as though they have read and believed the script, that 1st scrum sorted that out, one of their Backs ran at least 30m to congratulate the Forwards, they visibly started to believe. Sale are playing with the wind in the first half and generally kicking too long to trouble us but our fringe defence seems lax and Sale make a lot of ground through individuals getting through the first tackle. The defence was stretched on many occasions but held firm, eventually! We had one ruck right in front of us, ball presented beautifully, secured well, then Ben Youngs decided to see if he could set the world record for the longest @#$%& about at the base of a ruck, unfortunately Mr Rose intervened and we lost the ball, it was that sort of night.

It was on 25 minutes that Leicester put together a Backs move worthy of the name, moving right to left with pace, power and no little skill the ball got to the Hippo on the left wing, he was tackled well and was put to ground and it all fizzled out. Louis Deacon was sent for a rest for 10 minutes but it didn’t really seem to change much. And so, the first half was over. Did I mention the score? 9 – 6 to Sale, unfortunately they decided to ditch Hodgson after the first miss and the impressive Thomas did the rest. Both sides missed a penalty. So a stiff talking to at half time, control the ball, take your time, tighten the first up and fringe defence?

The second half started well, and we were soon at 9 points apiece. Then the sky turned black, not dark but black as if an omen for us poor Tigers fans, the rain and wind swept straight down the pitch into the Sale players’ faces and they stuck to orders, hoof it up in the air and see what happens. What happened was that the Leicester players were found wanting on several occasions playing the up and under, whether it was the lights, the swirling wind, the players, all three or none I know not but it worked for Sale.

Our response seemed to be to work like buggery to secure the ball and then kick it back to Sale for another go. On 75 minutes we played through some phases for the first time, possibly as many as 12, we didn’t get anywhere but I was happy that we were at least controlling the ball and displaying some patience at last. Julian and Mefyn came on and Roberts who had been very strong in the scrum against Castro, departed soon after. An interesting decision late in the game from one of our high kicks, it was Marked by a Sale player but I was always under the impression one had to actually catch the ball to be awarded the mark rather than simply fumble it briefly then drop it. Possibly the Free kick was awarded for something else, can someone enlighten me, however the Sale fans around me were as astounded as I was.

The clock showed 2 minutes to go and we mounted a ferocious attack driving the ball to the line, by my estimation the next 5 minutes were camped on the Sale line trying to bludgeon the ball over through the driving maul, Sale’s defence was excellent. I think we were awarded a penalty in all of this but chose to bludgeon on. We had at least a 4 man overlap on the right for a whole minute but we chose to bludgeon on, the ball was then released and I am pretty sure I saw Staunton cut inside and go for glory rather than give the rest of the Backs a go (if not I am sorry Jeremy). As fitting to the night, the game finished with us giving a penalty away for something or other.

Cueto and Cohen were workmanlike and solid throughout, Scott Hamilton seemed strangely off form and I am a big fan of his. Our 9,10,12 axis played, understandably, as though they didn’t know each other and the outside Backs suffered as a result. Staunton is obviously used to playing off a longer pass than Ben has as he was picking the ball off his toes a lot Mr Rose had a difficult night and not his best but that was not the reason we lost, we came a poor second in terms of desire, application and teamwork on the night. Well done Sale.

Another beer then home, feeling as black, wet and every bit as despondent as the weather. My thanks to the Sale fans around me for their company, this 3 point loss felt a lot more demoralising than the last one in the HEC final.