=Dragons were never going to do a Castres and lay down and die, not with Welsh Pride at stake after yesterday’s events at HQ. The gentleman in front’s blow-up leek may have looked a little deflated but nothing a bit of hot air couldn’t put right.= 

=Watford was misty and dank. 5.00 felt wrong – it’s going home time after all. Maybe that was the problem. When Dragons took the field I thought for a moment that the subject of my insomniac fantasy was coming true – they looked for all the world like our landlords in their yellow & red and I have often dreamed of a match-up between ourselves and Watford, 1st half association, 2^nd half rugby football.= 

=It all started brightly enough with Sarries winning a scrum almost under the Dragon’s posts from the kick off but although Mr Barnes (wearing fetching dayglo green that neatly matched the sponsor’s logo) initially gave Sarries a free kick, he then awarded Dragons a penalty from the 2^nd scrum and the danger was cleared.= 

=Sarries looked fairly threatening for the next 5 minutes and eventually won a penalty which Glen Jackson kicked. 3-0 and we’re off to Cardiff. After 10 minutes things looked even better when Sarries were awarded a second penalty and by virtue of pinching a few yards infield, Jackson made it kickable and duly converted it. 6-0 and looking up train times to Cardiff.= 

=There followed a period of messy play with some decidedly iffy passing and poor handling (poor Del had a nightmare). Some attempt was made to run the ball but Dragons were solid in defence. After 17 minutes another attempt to run the ball from the Sarries 22 stalled at the Dragon’s lair and from turnover ball, Will Harries broke away and ran past most of the Sarries’ defence who all stood and watched him score a try! Jason Tovey kicked a superb conversion and Dragons were ahead 6-7. OK, so now we’re off to Northampton. (Incidentally I should mention that it was almost impossible to identify the Dragon’s players given that their numbers were almost illegible being written in red in a strange font so apologies for the lack of clarity).= 

=From the restart Sarries tried to attack but everything was going through the middle where it hit a brick wall of Dragons. Eventually they drifted offside giving Jackson an easy penalty for 9-7. So it’s back to Cardiff then guys. 5 minutes later, following another period of unmemorable play Sarries conceded a penalty on the half way line. Tovey demonstrated what an excellent kicker he is by plonking it between the posts. Dragons were back in the lead 9-10 and we were back to Franklin’s Gardens. But before you book your ticket Mr Barnes finally got fed up with some off the ball interplay which seemed to involve former Osprey Justin Marshall and gave Sarries another penalty from almost the same place with the same result. Sarries back in the lead 12-10 and we’re back to Cardiff now.= 

=Dragons conceded again a couple of minutes later, this time not rolling away. The kick was almost in front but on half way and on limits for Glen and this time he missed. As the half wound down there were more screwed kicks, more knock ons (both Brits and Haughton seemed to have butter on their fingers), a laughable (well wait until later) attempt at a drop goal from Dragons (no idea who), balls helped into touch by players from both sides and finally on half time a Dragons penalty on half way which the immaculate Tovey converted. 12-13 at half time and back up the MI to Northampton.= 

=Not the most inspiring half of rugby but perhaps the good Doctor could goad them into something better. Like the song says, “don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone”. (Well actually we do know what we’ve got but I couldn’t think of another appropriate song). Boy did we miss some of our guys. We could have done with Borthers leadership, Cato’s inspiration, Goode’s genius, Barritt’s strength & determination, Ratuvou’s dedication (where was he when we needed him). They were all badly, sadly missed. Their stand-ins looked just that, stand-ins who didn’t much want to be there out in the drizzle.= 

=The second half started with a barrage of kicking. It’s hard to believe this team had scored 9 tries in its last 2 games because they didn’t look as if they knew where the try line was. Apparently this was in an attempt to gain territory but if you kick straight to the Dragons back 3 every time (and they never looked like dropping one) all that happens is you end up back in your own half again. When Dragons got the ball they looked dangerous. Tackles were at best half hearted (“Don’t tickle him” the guy behind me said after a particularly pathetic attempt). Inevitably Dragons scored again. Once again it followed an attempt to run the ball and a turnover. Harries collected the ball and chipped forward to beat everyone to the try line and score again. Tovey never looked like missing the touchline conversion and at 12-20 it was lunch with Mother-in-Law I’m afraid.= 

=Time for some reshuffling. Ryder, de Kock and Hougaard replaced Botha, Marshall (who was getting a bit too preoccupied in the off ball squabbles) and Jackson. Almost immediately Hougaard dropped a goal. 15-20. (Sorry mum-in-law we’re off to Franklin’s Gardens). What followed was the high point of a pretty low -ceilinged event when Tagicakibau, who was one of the few bright spots, carried the ball well into the Dragon’s half. Inevitably the ball was turned over but Wyles managed to charge down Tovey’s clearance kick (the only mistake he made all evening I think) and scored unchallenged. Hougaard converted and Sarries were back in the lead 22-20. And we were back to Cardiff! From the restart Hougaard seemed to be everywhere. Venter ended Haughton’s miserable afternoon by sending on James Short and Tovey tried a bit of the “anything you can do” with a drop goal to put Dragons back in front 22-23 and send us back up the road to Northampton.= 

=Reynecke replaced Brits who had a day of mere mortalism. The last 20 minutes turned into a farce. I can only conclude that Sarries had the result they wanted and had no intention of trying to get the win. There were a series of increasingly bizarre drop goal attempts from Hougaard that never looked like going over. Hougaard also had a crack at 2 very long penalties, one of which almost crept over (and had Mr Barnes marched it forward 10m as he should have done when Dragons kicked the ball away for the 2^nd time, would have done). With 5 minutes left both sides tried to boot the ball as high into the sky as possible to see if they could get snow on it. The crowd were restive. This was dire stuff. We were still loosing for goodness sake! With 3 minutes left, Wyles had the most appalling attempt at a drop goal when there was an overlap and chance of a try on his right. Doubtless the management will criticise the booing but it was so understandable.= 

=Into the final minute and Dragons were awarded a kickable penalty. Why they didn’t go for it and end the misery I don’t know. Maybe they wanted to humiliate their English opponents with a try at the very end. Whatever, they kicked for touch. Somehow Sarries got the ball. So now it would all be revealed. Run the ball and we would know they wanted to win the match and take on the Cardiff Blues. Kick it out and what had become increasingly apparent right from the start – they fancied their chances more against the Saints. Doubtless someone had worked out the cost of refunding all those season tickets and decided it was worth it. I doubt whether they had counted the potential losses of an abject display like this live on TV. Hougaard duly booted the ball into the stands.= 

=So now we know what we’re doing on 14^th March. Quick trip up the M1 to our some time home ground of Franklin’s Gardens. Still it’s yet another semi final appearance and one of these days we’ll get to a final, won’t we? Northampton has not been a happy hunting ground for us of late and on today’s performance there are no grounds for optimism. But except for Borthers, the rest of the guys should be back and this time they might actually want to win!.= 

=Footnote. Since we are in with a chance of winning the Punctuation Cup,I thought I’d find out what LV=  is. LV is Liverpool Victoria and the = sign is “because we are a Society of Equals, one member one vote”. All sounds very noble until you realise they are also sponsors of Harlequins!= 

Teams:- 

SaracensWyles, Haughton (Short), Penney, Powell, Tagicakibau, Jackson (Hougaard), Marshall (De Kock), Lealamanua, Brits (Reynecke), Skuse, Smith, Botha (Ryder), Van Heerden© (Saull) Burger, Joubert 

DragonsThomas, Harries, Watkins, Smith©, Fussell (Brew), Tovey, Evans (Leadbeater), Gustafson, Jones S (Goodfield), Castle (Palmer), Jones A, Sidoli (MacDonald), Lydiate, Thomas, Webb 

Scores: 3-0, 6-0, 6-7, 9-7, 9-10, 12-10, 12-13, 12-20, 15-20, 22-20, 22-23. 

Scorers:Saracens; Try Wyles, Conv Hougaard, Pens Jackson 4, DG Hougaard  Dragons: Tries Harries (2) Conv Tovey (2) Pens Tovey (2) DG Tovey 

Referee: Wayne Barnes Attendance: 5,939

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