By Dragons Den
December 18 2013

First of all a Merry Christmas and prosperous New Year to everyone. Lets hope that the team can head off into the New Year with another win under it's belt this weekend when we welcome London Scottish to the Kassam on Saturday.

London Scottish are our oldest rivals , having been our first opponents on October 24th 1885, a date that probably only PaddyTaf can recall.

A lot has happened to London Welsh in that time and in keeping with tradition the first half of this season has been no exception.

Just as at the start of last season we had to wait right up until the Championship final before we knew which division we would be playing in or whether we even had the finances in place to put out a professional side.

Even after that was al sorted there were still rumours abounding as to where would be home for the season. Then just when everyone thought that dilema had been sorted a curved ball was thrown when it was announced that our British and Irish cup games would most probably be played away from the Kassam. This was confirmed when it was announced that our first of four encounters with London Scottish would be played at, Newbury's, Monks Lane.

If you thought that was the end of our nomadic wanderings then you would have been wrong, when it was suprisingly announced that due to some stirling efforts by some London Welsh volunteers, our second British and Irish match would see the 1st XV make an unexpected , but welcome return to ODP, which in turn will also host our game against Moseley on March the 9th.

On the field though, things were starting to sort themselves out with the appointment of a new coach and playing personnel.

Right from the start Justin Burnell set out his stall and very quickly gelled the boys together and knuckled down to some serious training. Which appears to have so far paid off.

The pre-season friendlies kicked off with the team breaking the hundred point mark against Chinnor followed up by a brilliant display against Scarlets which saw the Welsh Region only manage to equalise in the last minutes, this was followed up by another convincing win against Henley, who put up some very strong opposition.

The season proper got under way with convincing wins over Bedford, Nottingham and Plymouth and London Welsh were starting to look like the real deal, with other sides starting to prick their ears.

Even when they came up against Rotherham Titans and it looked like the game had run away from them, they kept their nerve, their shape and stuck to the game plan and eventually managed to come out on top.

Despite a couple of slip ups in the British and Irish cup aginst Scottish and Ponty, they were convincing winners against Cornish Pirates with a scoreline that was not only a suprise to everyone, but also showed the true depth of the squad as despite coming away winners by 35 points Welsh didn't have it all their own way. This was followed up by another disciplined and determined performace where they turned around a 12 point defecit to overcome Leeds in the last 20 minutes.

This was followed up by a truely gritty performance where they beat many peoples promotion favourites, Bristol, by 22 points to 7 with a great game of defence and discipline, where they really gave Bristol a lesson in percentage rugby and how to take your chances when they come your way.

Next came two workman like wins, firstly over Ealing, where they kept the only clean sheet of the season so far, and then away at Moseley, despite it being former London Welsh favourite, Mike Powell's Birthday.

Unfortunately the next encounter  saw Welsh lose a very close and enthralling game against Bedford at Goldlington Road which sees them go into Saturdays clash with a 9 from 10 record in the league, which assures them top spot at the start of the New Year and after two back to back demolitions of Edinburgh Academicals, also a realistic chance of progressing through the British and Irish Cup.

Several new signings have been brought in recently which shows the clubs ambition to push on in the New Year and to not be hampered by injuries, some say the squad needs further strengthening and maybe that is true however the play from the guys out on the pitch so far has been outstanding and at times the play has been fantastic with great handling and poise.

In the background there have been a few upheavals with some wholesale changes of personnel within the admin department, combined with a move to new offices which are shared with the clubs new sponsor Henmans Freeth, in Oxford. But everyone seems to now be pulling together and heading in the right direction with the club finally seeming to have a co-ordinated stategy off the pitch as well as on it.

Encouragingly a new dialogue has opened up between the club and the fanbase, with regular meetings being held at both ODP and up in Oxford and also the formation of a second branch of the Supporters Club in the City.

I don't think anyone involved with the club whether supporters, directors or employees could be happier with our current league position going into the festive period and I'm sure that everyone on Dragons Den would join with me in wishing everyone involved with the club , both on and off the field a Merry Christmas and the best of luck for the New Year, when hopefully we can push on to bigger and better things.

Merry Christmas- Nadolig LLawen

Dragons Den