FROM MISERY in Munich to laughter in Limerick, such is the occasional weekend of the Scottish sports fan. If the Scotland football team were guilty of stage fright on Friday, Glasgow Warriors certainly grabbed their chance with both hands some 24 hours later.
But, now comes the hard bit – if monstering Munster was an unexpected pleasure, battering the Bulls in their Loftus Versfeld fortress will be an even-bigger ask. It's one thing to make the short hop to Limerick and storm Thomond Park, it's an even-sterner test to travel all the way to South Africa, overcome the problems of heat and altitude then beat a formidable home team, backed by a one-eyed support who make even Munster's Red Army look even-handed and fair-minded.
Still, it is the Scottish way to make things hard for ourselves. And we might have an advantage – the South Africans had gone into the knock-out games believing it would come down to them having to beat the two Irish provinces back to back, to take the title. OK, the Bulls' staff are well aware – Warriors beat Stormers to reach the last four. Jake White is a wise old owl, he respects fellow Saffer Franco Smith and knows full well, Smith's side will travel well-prepared to win, but, I get the impression from social media, the Boers who back the Bulls will take the Scots lightly. If that rubs off on the Bulls squad, so much the better for Warriors' chances.
What gives me additional hope for the Warriors is – in winning their two knock-out games to reach the final, they have not yet hit their straps. Yes, there have been magical moments, but, there have also been mistakes and moments when you really feared for them.
If they can produce a ten out of ten performance, instead of the seven and a half and eight ones which got them there, the prize is definitely within their grasp.
Warriors had to take a myopic and committed home support out of the equation at Thomond. Every decision Andrea Piardi and his team made, which didn't favour Munster saw the noise level increase significantly. Thern of course you had the Munster cheating at every breakdown. Yet Warriors stood tall, and nobody strood taller than the Fagerson Brothers. I thought Matt really came of age in the way he took-on Peter O'Mahony at what we nowadays call: “Shithousery”.
I have long felt, had POM had to live in the old days of punch-ups, “99” calls and real rucking, he'd have been a lot less-effective. He does the posturing and faux hard man stuff well, he is great at the cheap shots and the sledging, but, “a guid shoein'” or two would soon cool his ardour.
On Saturday, the Glasgow back row out-played the Munster one and that proved crucial, messrs M Fagerson, Darge and Dempsey will need to be as-good, if not better, in the tougher, more-rarified atmosphere of Pretoria this weekend.
Another major factor in Glasgow's success was how well the bench did. Franco Smith got more out of his replacements than did Graham Rowntree. Particularly pleasing was to see Max Williamson out-playing big, bad RG Snyman. The Saffer is made out to be some sort of super enforcer bogeyman – on Saturday's evidence, Leinster have bought a pup.
Further up this page I mentioned how the officiating team in Limerick were subjected to crowd pressure. I hope we get one of the absolute top men in the middle in Pretoria, because, from the social media reaction to Bulls' win over Leinster, we aint seen nothing yet when it comes to a hostile crowd for match officials.
In some of the Facebook rugby chat forums, Sam Grove White has been getting hysterical abuse from unhappy Safferes – and their team won!!! The Bulls fans will demand every decision goes their way – gift wrapped and presented on a silver platter.
[I recall a top Scottish football referee telling me – the two toughest games a referee in Scotland can get are The senior Old Firm game, and the Junior match between Auchinleck Talbot and Cumnock. He had officiated in both and in his view the best approach for a referee was to blow his whistle as little as he could – since the trouble really kicked-off after he had made a decision, since the side not getting the call would immediately object. I reckon, watching that Bulls v Leinster game, SG-W adopted that stance; try to keep the game flowing and not give the sides time to carp. But, sometime, that approach doesn't work – Satuirday was such a game].
That was only in a semi-final, Glasgow better look-out for some crazy “home town decisions” in the final. I actually thought Sam and his team did well in difficult circumstances in their semi-final. The game was between two teams, both of whom thought they ought to get every 50-50 call and who, at times, didn't appear to think the Laws applied to them, It was a really tought game for them – the final will be even-more-problematic, I suspect.
And, on the off-chance any Saffer reading this does do irony, or has a modicum of intelligence: let's take your argument that SG-W had a bad game and run with it; shall we call it pay-back for Craig Joubert, the difference being, Joubert was bent enough to ensure Australia, the team he was favouring actually won the game – another win for South Africa.
Sione Tuipulotu got the Man of the Match medal in Limerick, it could have gone to any one of six or seven Warriors. His stats in Rugby Union's new key metric: “MAC – metres after contact” were off the scale, and he wasn't alone in this.
This Warriors's side has already worked miracles to get to this final. They have had a fantastic season, now, they must, against the odds, regird themselves for one final push – it will not be easy but, the biggest Scottish wins in big games have generally come when they have been all but written-off before hand.
Saturday could see another huge win added to the list. Bring it on.
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