EDF National Trophy, Round 4

CORNISH PIRATES vs. NORTHAMPTON SAINTS

Saturday, 12^th January, 2008 - 17:00 MSK

The Castle of Franklin's Gardens

Once upon a time, in the shire of Northampton, at the castle of his avuncularship Lord Keith von Barwell, there lived a rugby team of very proud history. However, its mind could be read in its lineout (every single call), and its outlook, playbook and all-round game plan were characterised by the sort of utter simplicity normally only witnessed on Jamie Oliver's face. Probably, this was why the team had adopted the mantle of National League One Champions 2007/8, instead of one more befitting its breeding, such as lucky to just about be 11th-placers in the Guinness Premiership.

The Lord of the castle of Franklin's Gardens was one of the most powerful noblemen in the kingdom of Premier Rugby; as was evidenced by the fact that his castle had an erection toward its south so magnificent it would have made Catherine the Great's pupils dilate, car parks to put what will be left of Stradey Park to shame, and 10,000-plus souls desperate enough to see a game of rugby that they would pay the annual turnover of Pertemps Bees each week to see his lordship's charges stick 40 plus points on teams so amateur and ideas-ridden they could have been behind the copy for the In the Loop page in the Tugby Rhymes.

Exiled from Paradise

They were playing these teams after being exiled from the promised kingdom of Guinness and rugby after Loki Crichton chose to sign for Worcester, and afterwards, at the moment he took a crucial kick against the still-convinced-that-they're-a-proper-Southwest-rugby-club Warriors in front of the posts, he thought of the shiny static caravan in the Sixways car park he had been promised as a home and missed; also the Saints chose to display an inability to kick penalties, make on-field decisions, turn pressure into points and spent 22 games crabbing across the pitch with a lack of direction normally associated with Matthew Tait's runs away from support. Therefore, Northampton Saints were thrown out of the finest of all possible leagues with numerous, vigorous kicks from behind.

However, "It is demonstrable," some would say, "that things cannot be better than they are. For, since everything happens for a purpose, everything must be for the best possible purpose and surely this new league, and not that from whence we came, is the best of all possible leagues in which to play rugby."

The Castle's New Staff

Indeed, there was some evidence that the stint away from the manna of Skydollars was proving positive for the team. While the forwards that ambled about his lordship's last year pitch could, at a pinch, just about be mustered into an eight that sometimes made it to second-phase breakdowns before Lawrence Dallaglio had had time to write his autobiography, his own Reuters-headlining retirement statement, and copy the entire of À la recherche du temps perdu into pure osmium using a wisp of his remaining hair, this year's vintage were slowly turning into counter-ruckers and could even win their own line-out ball approximately twice a game as they added some of the more basic game skills to their repertoires, although at times they admittedly did receive a schooling in some elements of forward play from packs with a skills set about as varied as the chants heard at Welford Road.

Slowly but surely, everyone began to call Lord B. ‘Uncle' again, and no longer had to endure his interviews in the national press, which had become so ridiculous, far-fetched and embarrassing that they might as well have been an Andre Bester statement on Rotherham's championship credentials datelined ‘The Moon'.

Lord Barwell's reticence to pontificate in the media has been in evidence since he staffed his castle with a new team of household oracles and tutors. These men proved wise indeed, and saw no need to conjure up positives from strings of insipid, clueless performances comprising 78 minutes of pick-and-go-three-inches-sideways and shambolic New Year's Day home score lines against a club with a game plan so predictable it could be a Ben Cohen sidestep. This new coaching team was here to prove to everyone's satisfaction that there is no effect without cause: furthermore, that in this, the best of all possible worlds, Uncle Keith's Castle was not only the best of all possible castles, but that any rugby that his team played therein would always be the best of all possible rugby. A total of 102 league tries have now been scored to attest to this, but not everyone is yet convinced, arguing that by this stage of the year Saints should have posted points scored statistics with figures resembling the wage bill at Kingsholm.

A Kingdom of Plenty

Expelled from the earthly paradise of the kingdom of Premier Rugby, Northampton Saints may have been, but everyone was told not to be despondent. "Tout est bien, tout est au mieux!" they declared, before adding "now pay the cost of a to-scale statue of Richard Metcalfe cast of solid rhodium for a pledge ticket to watch us win with scraped bonus points against opponents so negative and forward-orientated that they actually are manifestations of any Western Mail match report of England teams circa Bill Beaumont." Indeed, this place was a place of beauty.

And Northampton were not met with warmth everywhere in their tour of the various parks, bogs, and dog turd-littered playing fields that comprised their new division, and in some places were instead greeted by a bitterness normally only witnessed in interviews with London Welsh coach Martin Jones, presumably because the team was seen as being sired a bastard by one man's money - the reputed sugar daddy being a lapsed Trotskyite paperboy whose son's given name oozed class, sophistication, intelligence, exile, and fey bumlicking of 1930s Soviet politics not normally seen outside of Pen-y-Bont Working Men's Clubs.

Although the team's name - Northampton Saints - was deemed by all to be agreeable and worthy, like the All Blacks, its trophy cabinet had only one entry of note, the others having long since disappeared into the sands of time after a period of celebration shorter than the latest golden era in Welsh rugby. Nor were the indisputably-wiser heads at rolling-maul.com happy at the presence of this arrogant team from the shire of Northampton in their division, claiming, with the sort of incessant only-aware-of-a-slim-part-of-the-situation moralising normally reserved for addresses by Bono, that the Saints' club crest was adorned with 2.5 million pounds sterling.

A Real Competition at Last!

However, some slowly began to welcome Lord Barwell's team, none more so than those in Little Wales, and so much so did it become evident that this is the best of all possible worlds, that Northampton even found themselves being availed of the once-in-a-lifetime chance to play in the EDF National Trophy, a cup competition only normally open to Real Rugby^TM teams.

Further proof that everything is for the best came with the fourth round draw, which afforded Northampton a third trip to God's County in five months. Instead of playing for a place in the Heineken Cup Final, as Northampton had been doing a matter of months previously, Fortuna smiled on them so much that they can now travel to Southwest England to contest a fifth-round spot in a cup competition so irrelevant it could be criticism of Vladimir Putin in the Daily Mail.

El Dorado

Upon hearing the news, all agreed that this was the greatest form of happiness there could be, and the announcement was met with a level of euphoria only once previously recorded - when the board at Magners realised they could charge 4x4-driving, cow bell-carrying Wasps supporters the GDP of sub-Saharan Africa for a pint of ice set in a shot of watered down Strongbow. Whilst many may have originally preferred a trip to Wharfedale, what could be better than the possibility to undertake a 1,000-km round trip in the depths of winter to a county which has its own flag for a dead language and believes the best non-country to model itself on is Wales?

As this is the best of all possible worlds, the Cornish Pirates, or, if you can speak Welsh and put on a Dutch accent - An Vorladron Gernewek - are the current holders of the EDF trophy, which was actually the last thing to be fashioned from the low-quality tin alloys once mined in the county. The trophy was won at Twickenham when they beat local rivals and NL1 also-rans Exeter Chiefs 19-16. The final was to be the Pirates' biggest ever game until September 9, 2007, when Camborne saw the 11^th biggest crowd in the NL1 season to date, and Northampton will have noticed in that visit that Little Wales boasts the best of all possible fans, probably as they employed the Munster Support Template®, which allows the team more fans from London than "London" "Irish" and to claim away attendance figures with one zero more than actuality.

There's nothing like seeing the world, that's certain, and if Northampton's notable departees had ever seen Camborne Rec, they would never have said that Franklin's Gardens was the finest of all castles (not that they ever do), but unfortunately for Lord Barwell and his loyal subjects who will make the journey to God's County this weekend, the game comes too soon to see the grandest of all possible castles, which may be built by Truro FC ahead of what should be a concerted Pirates bid to join the Celtic League, the Six Nations, or the least-preferred option, the Guinness Premiership. However, those who make the trip will still be able to enjoy Betty Stoggs - the best of all possible warm, weak beers - as they sit in a grandstand with less legroom (and in a ground which takes less account of people over six-feet tall) than Aeroflot long-haul.

A Short Stay

Although by December Lord Barwell's rugby team had by-and-large been reluctantly accepted into NL1, now acknowledged by all who saw her to be the best of all possible rugby leagues, it had yet to learn how to conduct itself properly in its new environment, particularly with regards to Cornwall, committing the grotesque taboo of insisting the trophy game be played on the actual sanctioned date of Saturday, 12 January, rather than kowtowing to their hosts and moving it to a Sunday to allow the locals weekending in their second homes from the capital the joy of watching Coventry aimlessly trundle around the Mennaye. Not only did Saints commit this great affront, but they then went on to again beat Pirates without encountering any real difficulty whatsoever and now, after 18 wins out of 18, look like being thrown out of a second (undeniably better) kingdom headfirst into the backwaters of GP rugby come May.

If the team do forsake the ability to be able to share their travellers' tales among these fortunate people, then they will truly be acting foolishly. With this possibility looking evermore likely to be realised, Barwell's sages are believed to have understood that the sole remaining chance to ingratiate themselves to the ma-gavta-la-nata-elite (rolling-maul.com) in this best of all possible rugby worlds, is to forfeit the second-tier knockout competition, and the trophy that goes with it, to one of the kingdom's elders, who inherently deserve it far more than Saints ever could. If Northampton go into the game in any other mind than completely up for it, they will not find this difficult to achieve; the Pirates will be more than happy to oblige in sending them packing, being as this is, a draw so hard it could be Eddie Butler listening to self-made voice recordings of his own Observer articles in a room wallpapered in pictures of him when he was still a host on Scrum V.

Opposition More Credible than Kasparov

Little Wales' backs have the style, talent and natural ability of Falco, although they are hindered by at times displaying the imagination and originality of Milli Vanilli. The Pirates will no doubt field their strongest available team, meaning the Saints will again come up against recent high-quality signing Tongan utility-back and interception-merchant Vunga Lilo - the only Cornish Pirates player to carry the ball into the Saints 22 in the FG game. The half-back axis of Gareth Steenson and Big Wales (defines itself solely by its bigger, more important neighbour and considers itself to be different just because it sticks a little red emblem on everything) international scrum-half Ed Fairhurst is capable of doing to Saints what watching JSD's Baabaas try does to Stuart Barnes' knees.

Looking forward, this is how the Pirates could line up:

Pirates: 15. Adryan Winnan 14. Paul Devlin 13. Vunga Lilo 12. Mark Ireland 11. Brian Tuohy 10. Gareth Steenson 9. Ed Fairhurst 1. Alan Paver 2. Nathan Kemp 3. Sam Heard 4.Heino Senekal 5. Joe Beardshaw 6. Tim Cowley 7. Stan McKeen 8. Matt Evans

The cornerstone of Pirates' play is their pack, led by superb lock, former proper-Wales resident and most famous thing to come out of Namibia since Percy Montgomery's mullet Heino Senekal. He packs down behind sturdy and able front rowers Sam Heard, Nathan Kemp and Alan Paver, and although the Pirates forwards can boast the strength of Putin's United Russia party, they do suffer from having the mobility of the Russian opposition, though this may not matter if the ground stays heavier and more bloated than the London Welsh front row, which would suit them better than Greg Garner's face suits a look of complete exasperation and bewilderment whenever asked to explain why a penalty was given.

The Best of All Possible Results

There has certainly been a concatenation of events in this the best of all possible seasons. Consider, had Northampton not been thrown out of what was previously believed to be the best of all possible kingdoms, had they not been forced to face a total of four meaningful contests in 18 months, had they not received one of the hardest draws possible in this, the best of all possible tin-pot competitions, why, Saints would not be able to put out a team containing some experimentation and some extremely promising academy products who would normally be rested for the Wanderers and the far more competitive Guinness A League. The management will now have the chance to find out a considerable amount about each player's employment prospects for next year in a real game scenario.

Therefore, the advice being offered to Lord Barwell's head counsel Jim Mallinder on selection would grant the following players the honour of running out on Camborne's best of all playing surfaces:

Saints: 15. Chris Ashton 14. Paul Diggin 13. Jon Clarke 12. COYSDC's own Grant Anderson 11. David Smith 10. Stephen Myler 9. Johnny Howard 1. Tom Smith 2. Dylan Hartley 3. Euan Murray 4. Phil Hoy 5. Alex Rae 6. Mark Hopley 7. Ben Lewitt 8. Mark Easter.

16. Paul Shields 17. Soane Tonga'uiha 18. Matt Lord 19. Darren Fox 20. Mark Robinson 21. Carlos Spencer 22. Bruce Reihana.

Although not exactly as daringly extravagant as a Brian Ashton team sheet, this line-up would be a little experimental, but would arguably boast the fastest back-three in English rugby and would be a chance for the undeniable talents of the academy players to show through, especially as two of them play in channels as alien to Pirates' forward-based game as impartiality is to S4C. It would also offer a pack as hard-working as Dewi Morris' tongue and a bench which could make the biggest detrimental impact to Cornish rugby since Paul Sturrock's first stint in charge at Plymouth Argyle.

The Long Trip

At the bottom of their hearts, Lord Barwell's team had no desire to travel all the way down to Little Wales to beat the Cornish Pirates, again, or, perhaps, even to play to win this competition, but professionalism and pride pressed them so warmly that they could not recant. One could imagine that after so many misadventures, the fans of the team would welcome a trip to HQ and the chance to live happily ever afterwards, or at least to return to the premiership studded with the diamonds and pearls of NL1, for example Senekal.

Unfortunately, it is man's fate to live in boredom or fear and September cannot come soon enough, when Saints fans can switch from a state of disinterest to the recent standard state of horror. Northampton this weekend will have one of their last real chances to play Vladimir Putin (due in power until May), before handing over to the Pirates' well-groomed and waiting Dmitry Medvedev. In the meantime, during the Saints' last few months in this, the best of all possible rugby leagues, all eyes in God's County will be focused firmly on the Guinness Premiership with the highest degree of Schadenfreude availed by a weak bottom since Suzie fed the All Blacks in Johannesburg in 1995. Next year may be the last time they have to enter this competition, too.

So how will this tale end? Despite ever closer winning margins, mainly brought about by a desire to play just a tiny bit better than whatever the opposition's level is and no more, Northampton's results have been in as little doubt as those at a Russian election, and it looks like Saints by 25 - 17, three tries to one, first try on eleven minutes (Hartley) and if I'm wrong and Pirates repeat the season-high score against Lord Barwell's charges of 26, well, it won't mean that this is the worst of all possible rugby worlds...

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