By R Le Quin
May 22 2002

After the euphoria of the fantastic European Shield victory at the Madejski Stadium against Narbonne, hopes were high for the 2001-02 season. When the squad was further strengthened with the addition of Matt Moore, Tony Diprose and Tu Tamarua (brought in as cover for the unfortunate David Wilson) and the return of Dan Luger and Bill Davison from Saracens the opening league fixtures with London Irish and Bristol were eagerly awaited.

Friendlies and the first month

Before this the team warmed up with friendlies against Bedford and London Welsh and racked up 116 points for whilst only conceding 5. These results only added to the sense that we were going places this year and our new coach John Kingston said as much in his first programme notes against the Irish. The players had benefited from an extended break and the new facilities at Aldershot made the arduous task of training a pleasurable one. London Irish were the pre-season favourites for the drop as they had virtually no “big names” and their coach (Brendan Venter) did not have the necessary experience to survive on the Premiership stage. Well, when the match kicked off, the only things that had changed were our strips (black shorts for white) as, on the playing side, it was a disaster. We trailed by sixteen points at the break and, although Paul Burke equalled the league record of David Pears with seven penalties, Barry Everitt got five for the visitors as well as converting both of their tries and adding a dropped goal to leave the final score at 21-32. We just hadn’t turned up and Kingston vowed to put it right for the following week’s visit of Bristol. The ensuing defeat (32-38) was even worse than the loss to the Irish as we had led 13-0 at one stage and 20-10 at half time. Schoolboy errors by Burke and Gollings led to fourteen points for Bristol and a second home defeat had been notched up. We had picked up two bonus points in this game so we weren’t bottom of the table (that dubious honour went to Bath). Up at Newcastle on a wet Sunday afternoon, a terrible game was only rescued when Burke dropped a goal right at the end to give us two more points in a drawn match (6-6). Our first premiership victory came on 22nd September when Wasps were our victims (33-13). Burke again got seven penalties with tries coming from Moore and Mapletoft and, after four matches, we were in ninth place. Worryingly, we were already eight points behind the leaders (Leicester).

The Heineken Cup debacle

Our poor league form was not immediately transferred to the Heineken Cup and a good away win at Bridgend (30-24) got us off to a good start in Pool 4. A poor performance at home to Munster led to a reverse (8-24) and when Castres came to the Stoop and conquered on 28th October by a score of 17-39, our chances of qualifying for the knockout stages looked non-existent to put it mildly. The return with Castres the following weekend produced another defeat but, this time by a much-reduced margin (18-24). One plus point to come out of this game was the performance at fly half of young David Slemen. When Bridgend visited us on 12th January, we had been thrashed by Munster at Thomond Park (17-51) although the scoreline did flatter the winners (a couple of dodgy refereeing decisions didn’t help matters). This meant it was between us and the Welshmen to see who would finish bottom of the group. In a tight game, we just scraped home (29-25) with Matt Moore’s try being the pick to leave us with a final tally of two wins and four losses. Unfortunately for us, our Pool proved to be one of the strongest with Munster and Castres reaching the semi final stage (Munster going on to contest the final with Leicester).

October – December in the Premiership

Our woes continued against Gloucester at Kingsholm and our inability to string together more than a couple of passes certainly didn’t help. We trailed by seven points at half time and against fourteen men in the second half (after Albanese had been sent off a head butt on Mark Mapletoft) we leaked nineteen points without reply. As a result of this, the players were summoned to a 9.15 appointment at Aldershot with John Kingston on Sunday morning. Nothing appeared to change after this as we only just defeated Bath in another awful game at the Stoop (15-8). Both sides were missing several internationals as England were playing Ireland but it was four points in the bag for us. At Northampton on 9th November, we escaped with a 13-13 draw when we should have won by a street (Northampton were absolutely awful) and this despite having Tiatia and Davison in the sin bin in the opening minutes. Saracens came next and with a weakened side were disposed of quite ruthlessly (43-6). Tries from Tamarua, Moore, Burke and Olver earned us another bonus point and we had shot up to sixth place after eight games. A trip to Welford Road again proved to be unsatisfactory and we only came away with a bonus point when we should have bagged a vital win. The trouble was that we couldn’t hold on to the ball and Stimpson beat Burke 23-18 but it was another tale of the one that got away. Sale came to the Stoop next and again we got a bonus point but, after being level at 13-13, we let things slip to go down 16-23. In the crunch game at Leeds, we began in excellent form in the freezing conditions and scored a try after only five minutes (Luger crossing after a power play from the pack). Instead of closing the game down after this and playing to our strengths, we let Leeds back in and made error after error after error. Two break away tries by Scarborough for the Tykes helped them to a 23-18 win and yet again we had thrown away points. When Leicester visited the Stoop with their full side out, we led 14-10 at the break (despite giving a try away in the first 30 seconds) but, we slowly slipped out of contention and after Healey had made a monkey out of Luger, Johnson ran round our defence like a three quarter and the final score of 38-21 was probably a fair reflection in the end. Our last fixture of the year saw a trip to Watford to take on Saracens and a six-try thrashing was handed out by the home side. Yet again, we conceded a try in the first minute and a half time score of 27-12 was transferred into a final score of 39-25. We finished 2001 in tenth place - just three points ahead of Wasps and Leeds.

Our usual saviour – the Cup

Our first cup-tie was an away trip to Sale (currently second in the table) and not an easy place to go when you are not playing at your best. We conceded a try in the second minute but a try from Moore and a conversion and two penalties from Burke enabled us to go in level at 13-13 at half time. A dropped goal and two more penalties from Burke put us into a winning position before Sale forced extra time when Hodgson dropped a goal from 45 metres in injury time (to add to an earlier dropped goal and a penalty). We again showed our famous cup fighting spirit (why the hell can’t we play like this in the league????) and O’Neill scored in the first minute of extra time for Burke to convert. Hodgson pulled back three points with his fourth penalty but Burke sealed the victory with his fifth (32-25). Before the final whistle had gone, Leicester were confirmed as our opponents in the quarter finals in January (a repeat of the semi final in 2000-01).

2002 in the Premiership begins where the old year left off (January-March) and a visit from some Sharks from far away

On 26th January, we met Northampton in the return and another poor performance led to another defeat. One bright moment was Chris Bell’s try after 46 minutes but Paul Grayson kicked two penalties and a dropped goal to send the Saints fans home happy (16-24). The same old excuses were trundled out by John Kingston …..long injury list……youngsters did well…….Northampton playing well etc, etc. This was just not good enough and was not acceptable for a team of our supposed standing. The away game at the Rec against Bath was a crucial bottom of the table clash and again we were found wanting. Yet again, the lineout didn’t work, there was little or no penetration from the backs and we conceded two early tries which proved to be the turning point in a 9-18 defeat. Against Gloucester, it was almost as if the visitors didn’t want to win the game and a dismal encounter was punctuated with our mistakes which culminated in Nick Duncombe gifting an interception try to them midway through the second half. A win for Leeds against Saracens sent us to the bottom of the table having played two more games than the Tykes. This proved to be the last straw for Chief Executive Mark Evans and he replaced Kingston with himself as head coach (although Kingston decided to remain as forwards coach). The return of Keith Wood against Newcastle inspired us to a 33-19 win with the highlight being a 75 metre run down the touchline by Chris Bell to score the match-clinching try (although Sherriff’s effort eleven minutes later got us the bonus point we so desperately needed). Burke added thirteen points with the boot and Olver and White-Cooper score the first two tries. Even though the official table showed us as climbing off the bottom, we were back there when someone pointed out that the number of wins took precedence over bonus points and points difference when points were the same (a rather ridiculous state of affairs it has to be said). How we managed to throw away the game at Bristol we will never know but in the end, we just managed to scrape a bonus point with two late tries from Wood and the referee (a penalty try). The final score of 27-43 didn’t really reflect the balance of the play but our defence did go to pieces between the 61st and 76th minutes when four tries were leaked turning a narrow 15-17 deficit into a whopping one of 15-43. Leeds picked up a bonus point as well and we stayed bottom with four games left. Mark Evans was fuming but how many times have we seen this from the head coach in recent seasons? Sandwiched in between the Northampton and Bath games was a friendly against the Natal Sharks which we lost 13-31. This fixture will be appearing again for the next few seasons hopefully.

Can we do it in the Cup?

Against the Tigers in the quarter final, we showed just what we are capable of against anyone. Unfortunately, this only ever appears in cup competitions! In a tight first half, we played against the wind and led 6-3 at the interval with Burke taking the penalty count against Goode 2-1. Smith went over for the visitors on 50 minutes, Goode converted and we trailed for the first time. The lead was quickly regained with a Burke penalty and his conversion of a try by Burrows. With ten minutes to go plus injury time, Kafer went over for Goode to convert and when he added a penalty five minutes later, it didn’t look good for our semi final chances. Enter Paul Burke to kick two penalties three minutes (the second from 54 metres and via a post) to send the fans delirious and the club into the semis where we met London Irish. This tie was effectively settled in the first 29 minutes when we conceded 26 points without scoring. Our tremendous fight back saw us score 27 unanswered points to go in front before a couple of dodgy late refereeing decisions (including a dodgy stop watch) enabled Everitt to kick the Irish into the final where they massacred Northampton.

The Premiership run-in

A trip to the Madejski to play London Irish didn’t result in a defeat but we had another victory taken from us when the Irish equalised eight minutes into injury time at the end of the game with a try from Horak. Everitt’s attempted conversion was brilliantly charged down by Luger and we had two points. Our limited approach had seen us score three dropped goals (Slemen 2, Gollings 1) and three penalties (Burke 2, Slemen 1) and come so close to a really vital win. Another Friday night game saw us travel to Loftus Road to take on Wasps and another pathetic performance followed. Watching the game, you would never have thought that we really, desperately needed to win. After Gollings and Diprose somehow managed to mess up a golden try scoring opportunity, a terrible decision by captain Keith Wood near the end saw Slemen miss a penalty when the better option would have been to put the ball into the corner and go for the four points. As we attacked one last time, Greenwood passed straight to Roiser who ran in unopposed to give Wasps a 16-6 victory. With us and Leeds losing and picking up no further points, it all came down to our final home game on Friday 3rd May when the Tykes were the visitors. We were now 11th with 30 points from 20 games and they had 28 from 19 so it was an all-important relegation decider. Paul Burke put us in front after three minutes before Van Straaten put over two penalties to put the Tykes ahead inside the first ten minutes. On 22 minutes, Burke equalised with another penalty (after he had been flattened by a late tackle by Mather) but Van Straaten dropped a goal to edge Leeds ahead again. The game had turned on that late tackle and our determination showed as Moore and Greenwood grabbed tries and Burke converted the second and dropped a goal to send us in 21-9 ahead at the break. Wood got our third try which burke converted before a goal from the visitors brought the score to 28-16 in our favour. Further tries from Greenstock and Wood (converted by Burke) saw us home by 40-16. The commitment shown by the players in this game once again raised the question of WHY? WHY? WHY? Can’t we do this all the time???? By the time of the final match of the season against Sale at Heywood Road, the relegation issue had been settled off the pitch when Rotherham were denied promotion from National Division 1. After a tight first half, we trailed 3-7 (Burke slotting a penalty to put us in front after 18 minutes). A five try blitz (including another interception give away) in the second half showed the gulf in class and team spirit which exists between us and Sale left the final score at 40-11 in their favour. Our try was scored by Moore after Mapletoft had kicked a penalty. With Saracens, Bath and Leeds all losing, we finished in ninth place – our best finishing position since our fourth place in 1998/99.

Overall view

This was one of the worst seasons I can remember watching and all the more frustrating considering the potential in the squad. I feel that at no time did all the players play to their potential in the same game (the nearest they got was against Sale and Leicester in the cup). I think there are too many excuses made for the inept performances of so-called star players and it is about time that they stood up and be counted in ALL matches throughout the season and not just when it is the knockout cup or when relegation really threatens (although how long ago was it really known that Rotherham were not going to be allowed promotion??). John Kingston was too soft on the players (looking in from the outside) with his press conferences little more than a repeat of the previous ones. Had he been tougher, would he have been relieved of his position? The players must be told that their performances in 95% of the matches was totally unacceptable and will not be tolerated in future – it is not acceptable that the great name of the Harlequin Football Club is mentioned in the same sentence as relegation! For me, the player of the season was Paul Burke (mainly for his match winning performances with the boot); best youngsters were Chris Bell, Alex Codling and Luke Sherriff (who will hopefully become a more regular first team member next season). My award for under-performers of the year goes to Will Greenwood and Keith Wood. I know it is different when you have a great England side around you but Will should be marshalling the back line (which is just too static). As for Keith – he really must learn to throw into the lineout properly (after all, this is what he is paid for). Good riddance to Jamie Williams – thank god that the management eventually saw the light and dumped him – after all, he had done nothing for two seasons but why we didn’t exploit his uselessness at Bristol I just don’t know! Since I started watching the Quins in 1972, I have to say that this was the best supported season of the lot - It's just a shame that the players haven't rewarded all that shouting!!

And finally, the question you’ve all been waiting to ask – when was the last time we won less than 11 games in a season? Does anyone know before I reveal all?