By Griff
December 29 2005

Back at the end of last season we got one of the largest shocks when everybody's favourite winger Paul Sackey, suddenly left the club for Wasps. It's not worth raking over the reasons or the events but Saturday may be his first trip back to the Madejski since then. Wasps come to us with a mixed bag of form, by all accounts their destruction of Llanelli at the Causeway was nothing short of frightening but they have lost their last two away fixtures against Llanelli at Stradey Park and, more of interest to us, to Newcastle. While our match at Kingston Park was tight in the end we did give them a comprehensive beating for much of the game.

With spirits running high after the marvel in Agen and the traditional Christmas Great Escape at Vicarage Road, Irish must fancy their chances here. The key, for me, will be winning the ball at the breakdown and our back-row have come along massively from the bad old days last season where any Tom, Dick or Lawrence could take our posession when he liked.

The team is now out and some of us did wonder if we'd target Sarries as a must win and bring a few of the youngsters in for Wasps. There seems to be a little of that, with Ross Laidlaw and Craic sponsored Richard Thorpe making their first team debut as starters. It does look, though, that we are simply rotating during this busy period to minimize player burn-out. Best of luck to these two, especially Richard who is, to my mind, getting a baptism of fire against Wasps in the back-row.

Paul Franze makes a welcome return after his storming (Craic Man of the Match) performance in Agen with Mike Catt back captaining at his side. These two will have to keep the Irish defence solid as Wasps attempt to turn on the style.

No wasps team as yet but you can bet they'll be keen to beat the "upstarts" just below them in the table. It should be a cracker.

So, what of Sackey? If he plays I think he'll find a very different London Irish facing him than the one he left that short time ago. We really have come a long way and we can at least dream of winning this one. The form book would probably have Wasps winning this comfortably but Christmas is a time for miracles...