By The Prof
February 5 2004

Was it an easy task or a hard one? Well we had a 33 point advantage going into the second leg but if Quins were to keep on with their winning ways the team would have to be the first team in a year and a half to beat Brive in Brive. The game itself was disappointing by recent standards, it is true that the referee didn’t help and the locals were so annoyed with him that he had to be escorted from the pitch by security guards!

Both sides were somewhat changed from the previous weekend’s match, Brive had their first choice home side out and Quins rested a few players, after all there was the extra game against Natal the previous Tuesday.

Harder’s early try did a lot to steady the nerves of the travelling Quins fans but it didn’t seem to steady nerves on the pitch where the defence looked decidedly fragile against some strong running from the Brive backs.

Burke’s boot kept adding points making Brive’s task harder and harder even though his conversion attempt just missed and two penalty attempts hit the uprights.

The game ended up getting a bit niggly with a few off the ball incidents, a few bits of handbags and some stamping, some of it was obviously down to the Brive players’ frustration at the referee’s decisions.

All in all it was a great trip to France, we didn’t win the match but we are through to the quarter final to face Connacht, this would have been the choice for many fans and players alike. It will be Gavin Duffy’s chance to play against some of his old team mates and the rest of the Irish contingent at Quins know a lot of the Connacht players. And John Kingston was the successful coach of Galwegians before he joined Quins. It will certainly be a very hard task to beat Connacht, they are not the whipping boys of Irish rugby that they used to be when the IRFU tried to get rid of their team a couple of seasons back.

Bemand, Davison, Dunne, Gomez , Jones, Moore and Winters all played for the second team too. Saracens were asked to reschedule the game because Quins had seven U21s in England trials and the 1stXV had played the night before but they refused. It didn’t help them although they were not humiliated as they had been earlier in the season. The Quins 2ndXV did score four tries, two from Andy Dunne who had a good day with the boot too (21 points in total) and one each from Sean Crowley and Tom Guest. It’s reported that Ceri Jones came on as a back row forward – what a versatile chap he is!

We all know what a great player Jones is but the Welsh selectors have decided that they have better props in Wales and Ceri hasn’t made the cut, it’s good news for us but it must be incredibly disappointing for Jones. Paul Burke and Gavin Duffy haven’t been selected for the 22 man Irish squad who will play France in the first round of the Six Nations. Another player who has been performing well for Quins but who has been dropped from an international squad is Tom Williams the young fullback who hasn’t made the final squad for England U21.

However there is good news, Greenwood and Leonard are in the England Squad, Horstmann and Monye are in the England 7s squad and five Quins have been selected for the England U21 squad - Henry Barratt, Chris Bell, Adrian Jarvis, Tom Parker and Andy Reay. There are another 14 Quins Academy players in the squads for England U18, England Schools and England U16 – congratulations to all those selected, commiserations to all those who didn’t quite make it. It really does show what a great set up we have in the Harlequins Academy.

On the injury front Ugo Monye has had to pull out of the 7s trip to Wellington because of an ankle injury, josh Taumalolo’s return has been put back because of a recurrence of his back injury before the 2ndXV game and Simon Miall is still recovering well and should be in action on the 16th February in the rescheduled 2ndXV fixture against Wasps (sorry London Wasps) – we wish them all a speedy recovery.

Elsewhere in the club the Ladies won their games in a triangular tournament against Rosslyn Park and Hove with tries from Katy Strudwick, Jo Everett (2), Lara Dudley and Saskia Brazier-Kobus. Not only did the Ladies win well under new captain of the day Vicky Gallagher but they also had a new player – the Blue Peter presenter Liz Barker. You’ll be able to see the Ladies on Blue Peter on Wednesday 11th February.

This week Harlequins also unveiled plans to redevelop The Stoop Memorial Ground with new North and West Stands and new debentures for sale. The future is not only bright it is also big!

Come on you Quins!