Northampton Saints
News: Ouroboros - Supporting your club team? why?
By Bullitt
March 10 2011
Being a lifetime resident from the parish of St James, Northampton, it was inevitable I would end up following the local rugby team. After all, there are 3 things in the area of note: Lots of pubs, Lack of sufficient shopping and a whacking great 13,600 capacity rugby stadium. I never expected however I would end up following the local rugby team through the length and breadth of the country back in the days when I occasionally bought a ticket for the Saints 5 times or so a year.
If I were to offer you one piece of advice, it’d be to never bother supporting your club team.
Now I find myself forking out for 30+ games a season, plus overseas
trips, playing for transport, food, beer, hotels, raffles, more beer and
(no doubt eventually sooner or later) some sort of bail on a weekly
basis! This is an expensive hobby, but I am beginning to ask myself “why
do I bother”. Let me explain…
When I first bought my season ticket, the fallout from the 2003 World
Cup Victory was in full swing; England had lost the Six Nations (and the
Twickenham record), the fans were turning back to football in the
mainstream and the doldrums were beginning to set in.
Saints however were still doing well. Finishing 3rd, they managed to
secure a place in the playoffs, but this was a game too far for the
ageing squad as they were trounced at Adams Park (or “The Causeways” as
it was known back then). This would be Wayne Smiths last game as the
boss at Saints as he moved on to take up his role with the All Blacks.
Smithy had seen an idea though – During the World Cup, he’d lost 4 of
his key players to England and another several elsewhere (Smith to
Scotland for example), so a plan hatched: Get a mostly foreign squad and
enjoy the benefits of having top-drawer players without losing them for
half your season! This is a professional game after all. The seeds were
planted and a good squad of foreign players including Andrew Blowers,
Chris Budgen and Bruce Reihana were brought into strengthen the team.
3rd was no mean achievement considering the likes of Rodber, Pearce and
Lam were gone, so everyone was happy for it to continue.
When Smithy left to be replaced by Solomons, the mindset continued.
However, it didn’t work. Krige, Kempson, Human and a whole raft of South
African players were brought in along with the controversial coach.
Things clearly went wrong that season (despite starting the season with 2
impressive bonus-point wins and being miles out in front on points
difference), as Saints had an 11 match losing streak, not helped either
by losing Cohen & Thompson to England duty throughout the Autumn and
Six Nations. Nobody noticed either as there was clearly bad goings on
behind closed doors as Saints players didn’t look interested in playing
for each other or the club. The mercenaries lost the will to fight.
Enough was enough as Solomons was sacked during the AIs when Worcester
embarrassed Saints at Franklins Gardens. Budge Poutney (along with Paul
Grayson) was promoted to head coach in an attempt to rejuvenate Saints
season, but in the end they still relied on a missed Jeremy Staunton
penalty to send Harlequins down to ND1, when frankly Northampton should
have gone down.
This lead to even more overseas recruitment in the form of Carlos
Spencer. The mercurial fly half was touted as the beginning of Saints
“rebirth”, but few saw how this could be the case following a 32-nil
drubbing at Welford road on the opening day of the season. Eventually
however, he and Saints briefly found their feet and after an unexpected
big win against Steve Diamonds Saracens began a run which would see them
rocket-propel themselves back into Heineken Cup qualification. Jon
Clarke fed off Spencers’ tricky playmaking and became the brightest
young prospect in England.
Sadly however this was not the rebirth, more like a final hurrah.
Saints, with the weight of expectancy firmly on their shoulders opened
the new season against Newcastle at Franklins Gardens. A dogged and
(frankly) uninspiring win, including a broken ankle for Clarke, and
Saints started what would be the most frustrating season in the history
of a rugby side. Week after week, Saints would let big wins and huge
leads slip through their fingers. These of course were offset by away
wins at Leicester and Worcester, but pretending for one second that
Saints had a good domestic season would be to lie.
In Europe however, Saints finished as the highest seeded runner up and
earned themselves an away quarter final in San Sebastian against
Biarritz. That’s be the same Biarritz who’d conquered them twice in the
group stage.
With 5 minutes (or so) to go, Robbie Kydd intercepted a loose Yashvilli
pass and sprinted 75m to the line, scored the most unlikely try in the
history of a rugby match (as Northampton had barely gotten near the
French 22 up until that point) and Saints progressed to earn a “home”
semi-final against Wasps – Looking back, let’s not pretend this was a
good Biarritz team. Now Saints, with their underpowered squad of
mercenaries, journeymen, injuries and aging heroes from yesteryear found
themselves dreaming of silverware while also terrified about
relegation.
Sport however isn’t a fairy tale. When your backline can barely catch a
cold, your fly-half is on one leg, your centre barely able to jog &
your pack MIA, you don’t win games of rugby. Saints crashed out of
Europe against Wasps (despite looking like the better team for the 1st
half hour) and looked to be on their way out of the premiership.
At the bottom of the league, Saints had a simple objective on the last
day: Win against Irish and hope Sarries do the same against Worcester.
Saints to their credit did their part. Sarries however did not, instead
getting hammered by Worcester all by halftime.
The foreign player principal failed. Saints went down. Budge stepped
down. Cohen, Wally, Quinlan and several other team mainstays left. Jim
Mallender, the Saxons coach, joined and brought Dorian West and a whole
raft of other staff with him.
He signed all sorts of young (mostly) English & British talent, most
notably one very rough diamond going by the name of Chris Ashton from
the Northern Union. You may have heard about him.
Saints bamboozled ND1 (undefeated with cups galore that year) and
instantly qualified for the Heineken cup on their first attempt (via
winning the European Challenge Cup). Saints Brought in even more English
players – Ben Foden, Shane Geraghty, Christian Day, Phil Dowson, Lee
Dickson, Tom Wood, Tom Mercy. Through the ranks emerged Courtney Lawes.
Clever signing for foreign players meant they kept hold of Soane
Tonga’uiha while bringing in Mujati, Vickerman and Wilson.
On paper, Saints suddenly had a team which could match any squad in the
world. Such a shame in that case that rugby games aren’t won on paper.
As proven by since Christmas when Saints have seemingly overnight gone
from being the best team in the land (8 points clear with 2 games in
hand) to the whipping boys having lost 6 Premiership fixtures on the
bounce – 1 was understandable away to Leicester, bur5 of which have been
since the international players were missing).
What we saw was Saints go from a strong core of England international
players and fairly successful – but not much depth, to a team full of
strong mercenaries, to a team full of weak mercenaries, to a relegated
side full of English kids and now a strong core of England
internationals but not much depth yet again. The eternal ring.
This sadly is why I question the value of my season ticket. It’s an
expensive hobby following my team around the country also. But what I’m
paying for is half a year of my team and half a year of the
internationals rendering the league worthless.
Apparently the playoffs “make up for the weeks when the clubs lose their
players”. Saints are now 5th. They were 1st. They have 2 more games to
play before the internationals are back. They could end up in 7th. To
qualify for the playoffs you must finish 4th. I’m pretty sure Saints
wouldn’t finish in the playoffs if that were the case. In fact, they’ll
be unlikely to qualify for Europe (barring a minor miracle).
Will the RFU refund my season ticket being as their robbing of our
players has effectively made it null and void? No, they won’t. They
offer playoff places and dish out money to the clubs. Sod the fans,
apparently. We’re only the ones who fund the entire fiasco.
So once again we’re back where we started. Ouroboros
The England players are missing, the season’s gone to pot, the club are
bringing in foreign mercenaries to cover the 6 months… I hate rugby.
Take my advice, never start following a team.
A club is worth more then a region or a franchies will ever be. Sadly
however, this means in the world of nepotism and red tape, they'll only
break your heart more in the long run
First Published as a blog by "Bulitt" on the Rugby Forum
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IT'S THE LEAGUE STUPID!
(nb not refering to any player or coach as stupid but it paraphrases clinton's words)
Top of the League 2014-2015 Season
“Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.”
Benjamin Franklin
Tetleys Block F E143
But now it has got even worse. Each home game, I go to my seat at 2.45 pm on a Saturday clutching my pork roll and vimto -to find myself all alone.
The game was either yesterday (Friday) or tomorrow (Sunday) and on each of these days the time will be different (1.45 on one day 5.00pm or 19.45 on another)and usually quite inconvenient. In most cases it bears no relationship to the fixture card.
But even if I do get to see a game ,as you say, for half the season the stars I have paid to see are either knitting in Pennyhill Park or warming up at Murrayfield.
Imagine how Richard Cockerill felt when Twelvetrees missed that penalty last week- while Flood sat watching a video in front of the fire in Surrey ? Against Saracens - a side who gets the cash from the RFU but does not (I believe) supply a single player.
Something must be done.
BTW - what does "Ouroboros" mean?
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