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Falcons v Irish


By MickeyMouse
April 18 2016

  I've always struggled with the phrase "all but". It caused me lots of problems as a child as I never understood what was being said. If you get the good old Thesaurus out on those words, you could use "everything except". Only somehow that is the exact opposite of the meaning of the phrase when all and but are put together, hence my confusion when it was used. However, for the first time in my life, I'm going to use that very phrase. London Irish are all but relegated. There, I said it.

OK, ok, so the most super positive people will point out that we're 7 points adrift and there's a possible 10 points to be gained from the remaining two games. I admire people who have this optimism, unfortunately this is an optimism that this weeks Match Reporter doesn't have. For the first time this season our relegation is no longer in our hands. If Newcastle register a win we are automatically relegated even if we do score the only try bonus points we've registered in the Premiership all season long and miraculously add 2 to the win column that currently reads 4.

 

Sunday I had arranged to meet with friends to watch over a few beers and bloke snacks and watch in the relative comfort of one of our homes. An extremely large contingent had made their way via various means to Kingston Park, but my funds are a bit short at the mo so went for the cheap option. My whole day cost me £7 for 8 tinnies!

 

The game kicked off to a nervous start with a bit of too'ing and fro'ing. My nerves were so shot, I managed to drop my beer on the remarkably clean carpet of my host, so completely missed a penalty attempt that went wide by Falcons whilst I mopped up my mess. Carpet saved though!

 

Tonks had the next opportunity after Falcons were pinged for not rolling away. Tonks lined up and the kick was straight and true. Irish were up after 8 minutes. It didn't last as Falcons levelled on 11 to put the score to 3-3. Nothing but a win would do however, we needed that 4 point gap levelled at the end of the match. This seemed to be on the minds of the players on both teams and both teams were playing a tight match. Falcon's defence line speed to midfield was superb and limiting the play from Irish. There was space out wide, but we'd have to play a higher risk game, something we were not prepared to do.

 

However, Falcons were pinged again allowing us to restore the narrow lead on about 18 minutes. Tonks had been receiving attention shortly beforehand with his right leg being completely strapped up under his sock and he was looking like he came off worse in a tackle. However the kick was good. Irish were looking the narrowly better team, but it remained a tight affair. And then came what would be the moment that decided the match. Tonks spotted space out wide and called for the ball from the ruck, Steele delivered and the Falcon's incredible line speed rushed towards him in defence, the ball went wide, very wide only there were no players there. The ball bounced into a rushing Marcus Watson, the ex-exile ran in unopposed, no one was going to catch him from there.

 

Only Tonks will know what the plan was, we had three players in the area the ball was played. One was way ahead of the ball looking to defend, the midfield player inside the ball was watching the onrushing defence coming to knock him over and the flanker on the wing was wondering where on earth that ball was going as it was no where near him!

 

Irish, now down 10-3 had a double blow as Tonks was taken off, apparently for concussion caused by the tackle that lead to the ball going into no mans land, meaning Geraghty was on. Geraghty had a blinder against Quins the week before in the Euro Cup, the only blot on his copy book was the amount of possession kicked over the top that wasn't reclaimed by an Irishman. Clearly for this game he'd been told to go out there and do his thing, but do not bloody kick it! It certainly made a difference as Geraghty's x-factor resulted in the Falcons defence giving him just a little bit more time than Tonks, the rush defence now giving an extra few milliseconds to ensure a ball wasn't to go over their head.

 

The drama of the half wasn't over however, Falcons launched a counter attack and punched a hole through the Irish defence with the ball being offloaded and collected by McGuigan who stormed into the 22. The ball eventually made its way to Alex Tait who looked to be having a good game, he was almost certain to score but for Andrew Fenby producing an immense try saving tackle, where did that come from!? As Tait tried to get the ball down Fenby used all his strength to push the winger out and into touch, the ball was kicked to safety after the Irish lineout and our lines were cleared. There was no further drama before the half time whistle.

 

There were also no nails left on my hands to bite…

 

There isn't much to write about the second half. Falcons had an early penalty to extend the lead Irish were the team with all the possession, the Falcons defence was playing very differently to that in the first half, with more space to play with but only to the left and right. Midway into the second half came the second main talking point. A looping pass had gone out wide to Tikoirotuma who had come on to replace Hearne. He raced pass a couple of defenders and only had one to beat, one a lot smaller than the huge and intimidating Tiko! However, he selflessly looked for Fenby on the inside and sent an odd pass his way, but Fenby had 4 defenders taking an interest to Tiko's 1 and he was tackled so hard the ball was spilled. With 2 forwards in support of Tiko even if the sole defender had managed to stop him the ball would have been recycled. Only Tiko will know why he didn't back himself, maybe it's because he had just come back from injury and wasn't 100%, maybe it's because he didn't see the numbers that Fenby had attracted. Whatever the reason, aside from a Geraghty kick over the top of the Newcastle defence that neither Fenby nor Maitland could recover to score, our best try scoring opportunity was lost.

 

On 70 minutes a stat came up showing the possession in the 2nd half was 70% and yet we had failed to score since 18 minutes into the game. At the end of the game, those statistics showed 509 metres made, 22 defenders beaten with 8 clean breaks and 16 offloads. Statistics that were better than Newcastle on the day. However the only statistic that mattered was the score, and that read 13-6 to Newcastle. London Irish picked up only their 2nd Bonus Point on the road all season. Another stat that came up on the telly was that Irish had won only once away in 18 games (now 19), and that was to London Welsh.

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Falcons v Irish
Discussion started by The Craic www.londonirish.org , 18/04/2016 12:03
The Craic www.londonirish.org
18/04/2016 12:03
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Iron Lung
18/04/2016 12:11
Nice one MM, the view from the box doesn't differ too much from my memories from the South Stand.

It can't have been the most enjoyable report to write so thank you.

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