“WHIT'S FUR YE'LL no go bye ye” is an old Scots saying with which we are all familiar. “Aye right!” is anothr familiar part of life in God's Country. The two contrasting sayings are perhaps the tale of half-time at Murrayfield on Saturday.
Because, at that point in proceedings, it was odds-on that Glasgow Warriors would be enjoying home advantage, back at Murrayfield, in the BKT United Rugby Championship Grand Final in two weeks' time. However, if you've been covering various Scottish sporting endeavours for as long as I have, you always, at the back of your mind, wonder: “which method of losing from a winning position will we use this time.”
That's long been a Scottish speciality and the way Glasgow lost their way and the match in the second half was just another verse in an auld Scots sang.
However, before I go any further, let me pay fulsome tribute to the victorious Bulls. Whatever was said in the visitors' dressing room at half time clearly worked, the Clunking, disjointed Bulls of the first half was replaced by a much-more focussed and united team, with whom Warriors could not cope.
A one-point win for Bulls actually flatters Warriors. If Handre Pollard had maintained his normal scoring percentage off the tee, then the game would have been won well before the final whistle. In the end, this was the ultimate game of two halves and proof positive: It's not how you start, but how you finish, if you wanna be the cream of the crop.”
I might add at this point, I thought Bulls, in the second half, played Referee Andrew Brace a lot better than Warriors did. Now Andy has had some shockers in Glasgow games, however, to be fair to him, I feel he is one of the most-improved referees in the game over the last two or three years. He still leaves you scratching you heads at some of his decisions, but, in the second period, Bulls were closer to being on Andy's wavelength than Warriors were.
There's another factor in play; over many year of covering Scottish clubs in various sports in big games, I've seen a lot of games in which the Scottish team has been cruising at half time, only to collapse in the second half. It's a national weakness – there is – too often - something missing from those crucial six or so inches between a sporting Scotsman's ears.
We saw this again on Saturday night, when, 4-0 ahead at half-time, our Fitba team couldn't add to their tally against a piss-poor Bolivia team.
I end this segment, as I started, with a bit of home-spun Caledonian philosophy: “Here's ta us – wha's like us?”
LEINSTER IS still the team to beat in the URC. They will have home advantage, albeit at Croke Park, against the Bulls, after beating Stormers in the second semi-final.
I had to laugh at the South African response on social media, with oor ain Hollie Davidson not exactly flavour of the month south of the Limpopo, after dishing out a couple of second half yellow cards to the team from Cape Town.
I must, for once, take Hollie to task for one of these yellow cards, the one, subsequently upgraded to red by the review system, awarded to Ruan Ackerman, to me, that was always a straight red card, but, it seems referees are becoming more unwilling to issue straight reds, prefering to utilise the safety valve of the bunker review system.
The Dubliners, with home advantage, will start as firm favourites, but, as we saw yesterday, these Bulls are dangerous animals.
No comments:
Post a Comment