Hot stuff: Mrs-Foden-to-be... Not so much: gardening during the game
It's time for our weekly wrap up of who needs an ice-cold beer and who should head to the shops for a new jumper!
Sssssssizzling...
Munster: With four rounds of the Heineken Cup done and dusted, the two-time champions are the only side with a perfect record of four wins. It hasn't exactly been flash rugby - it seldom is from the Munstermen - but they certainly know how to get the job done.
Leinster: Many pundits' pick for another European crown, the defending champions showed their class with a seven-try demolition of Bath last weekend. Three wins, a draw and a couple of bonus points have left the Dublin side equal with Munster on 16 points in the race to the top ranking for the play-offs.
Stade Français: After a horrible start to the term which saw the Parisian club struggle to get going after a major overhaul during the offseason, the men in pink are starting to find their mojo. A sixth consecutive win in all competitions is on the cards against floundering Biarritz on Friday.
Mike Brown: The Harlequins full-back has become a try machine this season. After touching down against Toulouse at the Stoop, he went one better by bagging a brace in that unforgettable return match in France on Sunday.
Milton Haig, Kingsley Jones and Eddie Jones: Counties Manukau coach Milton Haig has been appointed head coach of Georgia's ever-improving national team. Former Sale head honcho Kingsley Jones is the new boss of Russia's Bears while former Wallaby coach Eddie Jones is set to be appointed to the hot seat in Japan. Kudos to all three.
Premiership fans: Despite all the bad press surrounding the RFU and the England team, fans at club level in England are enjoying the game more than ever. A ten percent rise in attendance figures = good news for everyone.
The future Mrs. Ben Foden: We make a point of staying far away from 'celebrity news' but we'll make an exception this week because Una Healy ( she's a singer from 'The Saturdays') recently announced that she's engaged to England full-back Ben Foden. She's hot. Lucky fella....
Brr...someone turn the heater on!
Harlequins' touchline antics: More than any other club, you would have thought that Harlequins would make a special effort to stay out of unnecessary trouble on the sidelines. It's rare in rugby to see the ref have to reprimand a member of the technical staff or a player on the bench but twice in Toulouse Alain Rolland was called into action because members of the Quins contingent purposefully touched to ball to prevent the home side from taking a quick line-out. It's not exactly Bloodgate but it's definitely not sportsmanlike and Will Skinner's red card is likely to be followed up by more punishment.
The Stadium de Toulouse pitch: The problem with playing rugby games in soccer stadiums is that, unlike the prancing fairies that play the round-ball game, scrums tend to give the surface a good working over. Instead of being forced to bring on a gaggle of gardeners every ten minutes to do running repairs, we suggest that the groundsmen at le Stadium allow the grass grow a little longer and a little tougher.
Jerome Garces: It's our policy to avoid badmouthing referees but it was hard not to be frustrated by Monsieur Garces's performance at Liberty Stadium last Friday. Both coaches were very vocal about how the scrum turned into a bit of a farce and he struggled to communicate with the captains. It might seem like a harsh call considering most English-speaking refs couldn't give you time of day in French, but the problem seemed to lie less with his language skills (which are commendable) but the way he used them.
Castres: Fans of French rugby were left pulling their hair out by Toulouse's loss on Sunday but almost more frustrating was the way Castres approached their game in Northampton. Despite having given Saints a good hiding the week before, les Tarnais seemed to have given up hope of qualifying for the quarter-finals so sent a below strength side to England and were handed a 45-0 drubbing. C'est agaçant...
Aironi: Unlike Treviso, Aironi just can't get it together this season. They've won just a single game in 14 starts in all competitions and their points column in Heineken Cup Pool Four shows a big fat 'zero.'
Connacht: The newcomers have found live tough in Europe's top flight and are yet to pick up a win. The Irish side are putting up a good fight but aren't getting the results. Back in the Pro12 this weekend they head to Thomond Park - where they have not won since 1986 - off the back of a ten-match losing streak in all competitions. Tough times.
Compiled by Ross Hastie
Comments
Carpelone says...
Aironi are embarassing. School boy mistakes, Ulster commanded the game at their will, without raising a sweat.
Does anybody know that Toulouse # 4 should have been red carded by Rolland? At least a yellow.
Posted 17:20 22nd December 2011
NHsaints says...
@leinster_goy agreed, saints and Castres pushed them to the very edge (saints in munster) and Northampton especially were very unlucky to leave without the win...now we've found our feet again I would put the return fixture down as a possible losing point for munster...
Posted 13:49 22nd December 2011
Rosbif says...
@Lucasrg. hehehe. Yes, Foden seems to have joined an elite group with Sergio Parisse and Dimitri Szarzekwski, i.e. The Smoking Wives Club :-)
Posted 13:18 22nd December 2011
Lucasrg says...
Seriously...Aironi might need to look for another coach next season...they have half of the Italian national squad team (like Treviso) plsu some nice young talents but can't really do any good. I still wondering if a Roman "super team" would have been more effective. Let me guess Mr. Dondi (FIR president) is from Parma, what a coincidance.
I hope they can come out from this negative period and be more competitive.
@Foden
congratulations Ben...hope she can ruck!
Posted 22:16 21st December 2011
Willy says...
@jamesliveinhope the skinner incident was the second of the match. Rollaind had already spoken to the quins doctor for touching the ball in flight.
Nobody outside of the 30 players on the pitch are permitted to touch the ball in flight as technically the ball is still live. The ball does not become dead until it hits the ground (eg balled kicked over touchline & blown back onto pitch by a strong wind is play on).
So what Skinner did was illegal (would have been different if ball had hit the ground) and given that Quins were previously warned in this match for the same offence if not the same person, Skinner had to be sent off.
Posted 15:30 21st December 2011
12Counties says...
Not a blind bit of notice paid to Leinster until they trash a poor aviva premiership team. Now they're hot. They've been hot for weeks lads. The draw in Montpellier was a better result than the Bath game. Connacht will bounce back. They'll beat either Leinster in Galway on new years day or else Quins in the final group game on 20th Jan. Mark my words.
Posted 15:13 21st December 2011
petey11 says...
@ jamesliveinhope
It's something that happens quite a bit, I've seen our physio do the same thing BUT only if the ball actually came within touching distance. To actively go for the ball and almost return to the field of play in doing so in full gaze of all cameras is plain, good old fashioned stupidity. Cheating it is, punishable it should be, severely? I don't think so. His shame should be enough ;)
Posted 14:33 21st December 2011
Rosbif says...
@lawynd. 100% agree. Garces (in any language!) was truly woeful. Made me long for the calmness and humour of a Nigel Owens or a Dave Pearson :-)
Posted 14:17 21st December 2011
crunchfit says...
@Rodofle
Get over it. It wasn't that bad. It would have gone out into the stands anyway, and it wasn't a scoring opportunity. Fritz tackle was much worse as that actually stopped a probable try. Why aren't you criticising him?
Posted 14:08 21st December 2011
lawynd says...
@Rosbif - for my sins, I'm still an avid football watcher and the malaise of lazy and one-eyed punditry in the British Isles (I'm not exempting Welsh, Scottish or Irish pundits either) is endemic in that sport too. You've got Jiffy on the BBC who wouldn't cross the street to urinate on a non-Welsh person if they were on fire, Stuart Barnes who is quite clearly bi-polar, and any other football followers would probably agree with how woeful the two Alan's are on Match Of The Day, amongst others! Cricket isn't exempt either these days, which I attribute firmly to it moving to Sky for coverage.
As for Garces, I can understand the frustrations that the coaches had; no matter the language barrier, he wasn't even making the right calls to explain them in the first place. I don't like to whinge about referees but that was a shocking performance, even taking into account the general scrum lottery that we as fans and referees have to put up with.
@Rodofle - so you didn't see Clermont players asking Nigel Owens to give them penalties or send off Tigers players this weekend, hmm? Or as jameslivesinhope pointed out, the Toulouse use of ball boys for the same underhanded tactic? It doesn't absolve Quins but please don't act like this sort of shenanigans doesn't happen on a regular basis.
Posted 14:00 21st December 2011
jamesliveinhope says...
and what if the home ball-boys were significantly quicker to Quins ball than they were to Toulouse ball (I'm pretty sure that Toulouse have had that accusation levelled at them before).
Posted 13:05 21st December 2011
jamesliveinhope says...
Does anyone know what Skinner's actual offence was. Quite right its not sportsmanlike but nor is deliberately killing the ball, lazy running, blocking and a whole load of things that, if punished at all, typically just get a penalty.
How about a prop feigning injury to go to uncontested scrums.
I've only seen the Skinner thing on youtube and it looks like he and the Toulouse player both went for the ball. Would that have been an issue if it were a ball-boy?
I'm not a fan of unsporting behaviour but why isn't deliberately dropping the ball to lose penalty advantage or fielding a ball still in play with one foot in touch penalised.
Posted 13:02 21st December 2011
Rosbif says...
Was interested, as a Frenchman living in the UK, to hear Sky's commentary on Garces in the Ospreys home game. Pretty shocking. At least PR, you have a little more perspective, and rightly point out that most English refs would struggle in France with two French-speaking teams.
More interesting, though, was to see how quickly players lost respect for him, became "frustrated" and resorted to niggle and petulance. And how Coaches from both teams, by openly ridiculing the ref, seemed to suggest their players' behaviour was OK, or at least understandable given the "provocation" of bad reffing.
This is a very dangerous and slippery slope. At grassroots level, how many of us have watched our sons in U8s through to U18s games and experienced verbal idiocy from other parents on the touchline? At the top level, how many times have the French national side been stereotyped as having "discipline" problems, simply because they don't understand the ref, or have become "frustrated" by decisions they don't understand? When Dubroca grabbed David Bishop by the throat after the 19-10 loss to England in RWC 1991, it somehow ticked all the boxes of 20 years of Anglo-Saxon prejudice. But at 10-10 with 5 minutes to play, go check out the tape to see what a shocking pen decision Bishop gave....
Anyway, I don't mean to rant. Thank goodness for the HCup, and the huge number of classy foreign players playing in Top14, and the greater international entente the French now have. Hehehe, we even have the Trevor Brennans and Jamie Cudmores of the world to show us that violence isn't a purely national trait. Just wish the UK commentators could somehow move on from the 1970s :-)
Posted 12:53 21st December 2011
Rodofle says...
Shame on the "Queens", they're a disgrace to rugby world, what a ridiculous club... Really pathetic behaviour, never seen that in rugby before.
Posted 12:34 21st December 2011
leinster_goy says...
munster's limitations will be shown up eventually, as surely as **** attracts flies
Posted 11:16 21st December 2011