By Rob Richmond
August 19 2006

Watching rugby on the night Simbles lost his head…. Ah, preseason friendlies, It’s like having teeth pulled….. To be honest they’re a necessary evil, like the Middlesex sevens

Bath vs. Parma scouting mission

 

Watching rugby on the night Simbles lost his head….

 

Ah, preseason friendlies,

 

It’s like having teeth pulled…..

 

To be honest they’re a necessary evil, like the Middlesex sevens, no one really likes them but after two of three months of watching tri-nations or NPC or currie cup rugby you willing to except anything, just like Simon and his favorite barmaid….

 

Imagine how much worse it is if you haven’t succumbed to sky….

Oh you poor souls…

 

Any who, I’ve not been to see anything since the Sale game on the final day, so considering heading up to Fridays friendly against Llanelli was tempting but not feasible after finishing work at 5 30 and trying to get Bath is bad enough let alone trying to get through Swindon and Oxford…

 

So, take it where you can get it, that’s what I say….

Bath vs. Parma, what a lovely opportunity to scout our future European group opponents.

 

Well that’s not strictly true…

 

I was somewhat ordered to check out Parma by message board regular Christy, not someone you wish to make an enemy of. For its said ‘Christy has the power to kill a yak from 10 feet using her mind bullets’ as Wellsaint so eloquently put it….

 

Hey, those of you who have met know I’m pretty much yak sized so it put the willies up me a bit. I can see it now, ambling back from the loos in the bus club in a state of disrepair, looking to continue my look running argument with Ajack as to why Simon shouldn’t be allowed to wear a Saint’s shirt to home game and only to games away from home where Jacka isn’t present.

 

Jacka claims people are watching us but I don’t believe him though Si fears that horrible scene from marathon man with Jacka standing over him with some rusty dental tools repeatedly asking him, ‘’is it ironed?’’ ‘’is it ironed?’’ ‘’is it ironed?’’ perhaps Simbles (Si’s pet name round our way) should lay off the cheese before bed, either that or stop eating the dead cheesy skin off his feet….

 

Anyway, back to my vivid imagination, wondering back to argue with Jacka and all of a sudden I drop dead and spill my pint all over that pretty barmaids boobies (always thinking of the boys, me, there’s no I in team and all that) Christy strikes like that evil chap in scanners, standing over my dead body with blood seeping out of ears, Christy grabs the tickets from my cold dead hands and proceeds to spend the game in the players family section and look with distain at so many young and skinny and pretty women….

 

Yeah, maybe I should lay off the cheese sarnies before bed too…

 

So to the game…

 

Now, if you’ve been over to ERE and had a bit of a butchers at the topic ‘tonight’s score’  you may well be lead to believe this was the most one sided game that has ever been played ever, ever, ever,

Well, as always you can trust me to disagree with the beasts of burden from Hanham, Bitton, Frome, Westwood and Radstock, it wasn’t as good a performance as the score suggests.

Quite why Bath felt the need to field an almost full strength team and almost certainly a full strength pack against a weakened Parma team is a topic that could be discussed for years and years on ERE and probably will rage as long as their deep discussion into whether of not Chris Mallones hair is naturally curly or if he’s had it permed…

Anyway, the eventual score was 61- 0 to the home team but it could have been a lot more but for Parma taking 15 to 20 minutes to sort out their backline defense.

 

As usual Danny ‘(firmly) No,’ Grewcock had decided to take up his usual position of getting in the way of the 10 and 12 channel which is now officially known as the Grewcock hole and can be seen from many a satellite flouting about in the sky like a big floating spacey, viewy, telescopey thing that’s watching our every move and even knows when you’re sat at home in front of the box on your own and everyone else has gone to bed and you’re thinking about flicking over to one of those naughty channels…

Yeah that good a satellite….

 

The best way to explain the Grewcock hole (And also why his name above has ‘(firmly) No’ in the middle) is to probably through some sort of role play…

 

 

Ok, you be Danny Grewcock and I’ll play his England team mate Charlie Hodgson.

Don’t worry your only line is ‘(firmly) No’

 

Charlie: Eey up Danny would ye mind just getting out t’way fur us?

Danny: (firmly) No.

Charlie:  Aww, come on will ya, I just wanna pass t’ball over that way t’Josh.

Danny: (firmly) No.

Charlie: just move a bit will’ya! Those paddies are getting closer! I’ll give you a crash ball next time….

Danny: (firmly) No.

Charlie: Oh bloody hell here, take it.

 

Repeat until beaten.

 

So the only way Bath can move the ball is after firstly putting the big one word fight machine through on a crash. Now, that terrific if you’re facing a 5ft 5 little fly half who looks like Mark Mapletoft who comes to terms with the hair loss. So they did it, over and over again. Bath found gaps aplenty in the opening 10 minutes and flopped over the line twice thanks to Shaun Berne coming to terms with Grewcock and when they did get quick ruck ball pressing himself and Eli Fuimaono-Sapolu through the gap, firstly setting up Michael Stephenson to go through under the posts, then Fuimaono-Sapolu capitalised on a break from Nick Walshe to pop under the posts for a second time inside of 5 minutes.

 

21 nil up and the writing was on the wall...

 

Parma, realizing they had problem in their first up defence swapped their fly half and scrum half to try and handle the monsters coming through the middle. Pellicena, the Parma skipper was as brave as lion all night and was able to slow down the bath furrow forward thanks in no small part to some tenacious tackling. Despite his bravery it wasn’t matched by his team mates who tried to match Baths beef with some underhand shenanigans, but hey, doesn’t everyone. Borthwick got a smack in the mush and hurt his shoulder at the bottom of a ruck, off he came and on came Rob Fidler came on assist Danny Grewcock  as he thundered over in the corner after some lovely interplay by Shaun Berne and Chris Goodman sent Parma’s defence into a state of shock.

 

However this is actually where Parma came into their own. After a good slurp of water under their posts from a fitness guru with fantastic calves and a bald head (what is it about fitness gurus? Is it the law that they all have to be short on hair, have outrageous calves and seem determined to wear shorts regardless of the weather?)  The Parmarainians showed some grace and a smattering of power as they got a bit of ball and pressurized the Bath defense.  A little bit of this and a bit of that showed me that they won’t be a push over, especially when we have to head down to the med.

 

 

Halftime and the score was a respectable 28-nil, considering the wheels had come off so spectacularly in the opening 20 minutes……

 

From the first half we learnt,

They don’t like it up ‘em   in a Grewcock stylee (take note big Damo and medium sized Dan Browne)

They’re not especially well disciplined and will certainly allow us plenty of pots at goal or, if not, opportunities to put the ball in the corner.

They’re very capable of opening us up if the little jinky fly half gets the chance to run at some of our, how shall I put it, tackling challenged forwards. He may look like Paul Burke or the man Mark Mapletoft would if he came to terms with his lack of hair on his barnet, and didn’t kick it all the time,  but has a great depth of skills and a step to die for. However if you ran at him all day you should get some good results.

 

 

Second half started quite quickly, either that or I had the longest pee ever. Parma came out of the blocks all guns blazing and very nearly started a comeback that would of have one or two of 2500 in attendance a tad worried as a replacement Sego Nadridri, who looked big of head and strong of thigh, intercepted a pass from Shaun Berne and floundered towards the line as I sounded off like an even more demented version of John McCirrick calling home a nag,

 

‘’GO ON MY SON! RUN! RUN FAST! RUN FAST UNITL YOU REACH THAT LINE THEN PUT THE BALL DOWN!!!’’

 

Nadridri huffed and puffed down the middle of the pitch, running like a demented manatee, then that little so and so Andy Williams caught him 5 meters short of the line.

 

‘’OOH DRAT!’’

 

Parma deserved better than that, despite the long periods of possession given to Bath they were still deserving of some good play yet, sadly no nearer their quarry. 

 

The tables turned once again as Andy Williams found himself on the end of yet another intercept and scurried over the line from wide out untouched.

 

 

“OOH CHISEL!”

 

Within five minutes of the second half the game was well and truly over. Made doubly so as David Bory found plenty of time and space to outwit his opposite number and blast over after some clever interplay in the middle of the field from Barkley and Malone. And Malone himself found time in his busy schedule of hair permanents to cross over as well. The game was so over that my mind began to wonder as did my interest….

 

Simbles was well away with it, constantly turning to me and saying

‘’Ooh Rob, doesn’t my hair look good?”

Yes, he is annoying; he also has a wide range of bruises on his legs from me…. So if anyone does happen to see him walking around franklins gardens on Saturday with a funny limp then you know why, either that or he has just come back from the bus club!

“Rob, I think we should call the jinky fly half jinglejanglerrrrrrrr (rolling your tongue)rrrrrupetititynumbophardwareshopsarajevo “

 

Yes, I am concerned that my brother may well be taking monumental amounts of mind altering drugs, if anyone does meet him tomorrow feel free to give him the number for frank.  Either that or he’s seen fear and loathing in Las Vegas waay to many times…..

 

He even tried to convince a group of young Americans children who had never been to a rugby game before that Bath were called the Bath Trouser snakes. Persisting and pestering the kids he tried to get them to sing …

 

“LET’S GO TROUSERS!”

 

 

Fortunately it didn’t take off….

 

Simbles was out of control, bored to the point of insanity, the kind of general malaise that  only the genius possess and the insane lament (though my father isn’t a self improving boulangerie owner with low grade narcolepsy and a penchant for buggery) . To be honest he was getting on my wick, I was trying to enjoy Parma doing the damnedest to frustrate Bath and get on the score sheet.  But his mental ness was getting  the better of me, yes, there was a game going on ,between me and him, I couldn’t get comfortable in my seat, mainly down to Simbles twittering on in my ear about his hair or how his eyebrows seem to grow asymmetrically.

 

Ooh! Someone scored!  Was it Parma? No, Zak Feaunati rumbled over from what looked like a typical lineout drive.

‘’Cheers Simbles that me of been the best try ever scored and I missed because you were going on and on about how the Parma prop should be called solmonfigarobingdellfagoul-fishcake, you really burn my canole!.’’

‘’Yeah but it wasn’t was it”

“Yeah but you’re still a buffalo egg. Look at the state of you. Wondering about like a piano salesmen in your hobnail boots having deep conversation with the seagulls.  You’re such a flag pipe, you know what you’re the Willy Wonka of Goths!”

“Hey I like that, I could go with that, it’s like Joseph and his Technicolor dream coat but worn by Robert Smith from the cure, I could start my own trend….”

 

And he went on and on and on for another five minutes. Someone else scored, god knows who, and Simon was meandering about the stands now. Asking people if they fancied a game of shove h’appeny or if they have ever had their day made by a baked potato.

 

I’d had enough…

‘’stuff this lets go home’’

 

And we did, via a trip to KFC. Simbles decided to offer homeless people napkins on the way back to the car, and well when he found out that England were 4-0 up at half time I genuinely though he was going to cry…..

 

So what did we learn...?

 

Put Damo through the middle…

Pressurize their half backs into mistakes

Be patient.

Do not let Simon anywhere near cider and for gawds sake don’t tell him how good his hair looks….

 

 

But do wind him up about that barmaid in the bus club, I wonder if he’ll get a slap or a kiss when he sees her tomorrow….

 

Hey she may even have a bump…..

 

BATH:

15. M Stephenson

14. A Higgins

13. A Crockett (Mangeolles, 62)

12. E Fuimaono-Sapolu (Barkley, 56)

11. D Bory

10. S Berne (Malone, 50)

 9. N Walshe (Williams, 41)

 1. D Flatman (Barnes, 41)

 2. L Mears (Hawkins, 62)

 3. D Bell (Loader, 59, Flatman, 74)

 4. S Borthwick (captain; rep: Fidler, 19min)

 5. D Grewcock

 6. P Short

 7. C Goodman (Scaysbrook, 41)

 8. I Feaunati.
Replacements:

16. R Hawkins  

17. D Barnes

18. C Loader

19. R Fidler

20. M Mangeolles

21. O Barkley

22. C Malone  

23. A Williams

24. J Scaysbrook.

PARMA:

15. G Fontana

14, G Ghidini

13. A Orsi

12. A Chillon

11. A Mazzuccato

10. F Mazzariol

 9. J Pellicena (captain)

 1. G Fontana

 2. B Masetti

 3. F Staibano (sin-bin, 39-41)

 4. F Gumiero

 5. F Minello

 6. P Sciaretta

 7. L Pascu

 8. R Barbieri.
Replacements:

16.T Paoletti

17. L Zanini

18. M Barbieri

19. J Soffredini

20. M Frati

21. A Canale

22. S Nadridri.