Sunday Social: Double celebrations and Baa-baas blunder

Adam Kyriacou

It is time for Planet Rugby’s Sunday Social, your quirky recap of the serious and not so serious talking points from the past week’s action.

Following their Champions Cup victory last week, Exeter made it a memorable double as they beat Wasps in a gripping Premiership final at Twickenham on Saturday.

It has been some journey for Exeter and one of their stalwarts, Gareth Steenson, wasn’t allowed to miss the celebrations as he was dragged away from an interview.

Of course it would have been an extra special occasion had Twickenham been packed full of supporters and FAB Rugby showed just what a different experience it was.

https://twitter.com/fab_rugby/status/1320348133042327552

Before the showpiece domestic game, international rugby took place in Dublin where Ireland met Italy. This Gif pretty much sums up what has been a difficult year.

Ireland ran out comfortable winners in that re-arranged Six Nations clash with two debutants shining. However, veteran Peter O’Mahony stole the show with this.

Over in Paris later that day, it was France against Wales and how pleasing it was to hear the Welsh anthem belted out before international rugby once again? Love it.

In that game Wales second-row Alun Wyn Jones equalled Richie McCaw’s record of 148 caps, an incredible landmark to hit and one he is set to pass next week in Llanelli.

The big off-field drama this past week, however, came in Twickenham where several Barbarians got themselves in trouble for breaching the team’s coronavirus protocols.

It was all fun and games in the above tweet but then the likes of Chris Robshaw, Richard Wigglesworth and Sean Maitland were named as those who had broken the rules.

Subsequent apologies followed from some players involved, but the words were somewhat hard to believe from Robshaw after he then liked this tweet from Piers Morgan.

The vast majority have been critical of the players’ move to flout the rules and this post repeating a 16-year-old’s view on the subject pretty much nailed the blunder.

https://twitter.com/baldybeardyguy/status/1319638635705028608

This, from Chris Campbell, also hit home with us as we have all had to sacrifice during this difficult period so it was disappointing to see the story unfold this week.

Enough of the negative though and let us end with a positive news story as Italy back-row Maxime Mbanda received a well deserved award following his amazing effort as a volunteer for the Parma ambulances during the worst period of the Covid-19 pandemic. The international forward was given the Knight of Merit award. Well done, Maxime.

 

England