Who’s hot and who’s not!

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It’s time for our Monday wrap of who has their name in lights and who’s making the headlines for all the wrong reasons over the past week.

THEY’RE ON FIRE

Jaguares: The Jaguares are a much-improved side under Mario Ledesma and on the road it’s definitely started to show. The time spent working on their set-piece has paid dividends, while the team from Buenos Aires have also improved their work at the breakdown. The last three weeks has seen them pick up successive victories over the Rebels and Brumbies culminating in a groundbreaking first ever victory against New Zealand opposition in the form of the Blues most recently in Round 11 of Super Rugby in Auckland. Incredibly they are now second in the South African Conference.

Worcester: Premiership status secured and in some style too. The Warriors thrashed an out-of-form Harlequins 44-13 in front of the Sixways faithful in a fitting send-off to one of rugby’s most colourful characters, Donncha O’Callaghan. The tries came from Bryce Heem, Jackson Willison (2), Darren Barry, Ben Te’o, Francois Hougaard and Jamie Shillcock as this result sent London Irish down to England’s second tier.

PRO14 qualifiers: Congratulations to Edinburgh, Scarlets and Cheetahs as their seasons continue, for another week at least. Edinburgh were assured of knockout rugby even before they kicked off against Glasgow after Ulster failed to get five points at Munster, Scarlets were too hot for the Dragons while the Cheetahs’ debut term is not over yet. For Edinburgh and the Cheetahs in particular this is some achievement.

Agen: An outstanding achievement by Philippe Sella’s men to mathematically secure their Top 14 status for another year. They did so in style, winning three games in succession, which culminated in an impressive 27-17 triumph over defending champions Clermont Auvergne. Agen dominated the match after Sebastien Vahaamahina was red carded and opened up a 24-3 buffer after 52 minutes. Although the visitors responded with a couple of tries, it did not take the shine off what was a superb day for last season’s Pro D2 play-off winners.

Newcastle and Vereniki Goneva: What an incredible season it’s been for the Falcons and their experienced Fijian winger Goneva. The powerful back may be 34 but he’s been in outstanding form for the Tynesiders and was their inspiration as Dean Richards’ men defeated Leicester Tigers, a result which secured their top-four place. The Pacific Islander is a former Leicester player as well, which makes you question what their hierarchy were thinking by letting him go.

Fiji: A third Sevens success in a row after they won in both Vancouver and Hong Kong, the Pacific Islanders now lead the series ahead of South Africa. It had been a reasonably slow start by the Fijians in this year’s competition but they have well and truly found their form following this triumph in Singapore. Fiji were made to work for this victory, however, and appeared to have lost when John Porch touched down for Australia, but Alosio Sovita Naduva won the game late on.

COLD AS ICE

Rebels: It all looked so promising for the Melbourne-based outfit but they have been pretty awful since their positive start, which yielded four victories out of five. The heavy home defeat to the Hurricanes seems to have had a catastrophic impact on Dave Wessels’ men and three more losses have followed. Their latest came against the Stormers where they were once again outplayed, succumbing 34-18 to the South African team.

End of an era: It has been a week of goodbyes as rugby says, or prepares to say, farewell to some household names. Bryan Habana of course tops the list as he bows out at the end of the season, while Canada Sevens legend John Moonlight is calling time with immediate effect to take up a fire-fighting job. Elsewhere, Leinster’s Isa Nacewa and Richardt Strauss are retiring while Worcester, Munster and Ireland legend Donncha O’Callaghan played his last home game on Saturday, helping his club survive the drop at the expense of David Paice’s London Irish.

Brive and London Irish: They were relegated from their respective competitions. Brive’s defeat to Stade Français, coupled with Oyonnax’s triumph over Lyon, confirmed their place at the bottom of the Top 14, while the Exiles succumbed in the Premiership after Worcester’s win on Saturday. The French outfit will rue a poor start and end to the campaign but, for Irish, they were never really in contention, despite defeating Harlequins in their opening game. Both may have a battle on their hands to return next year too with some ambitious clubs in France and England hoping to gain promotion to the top-flight.

Leicester: For the first time since 2004, the Tigers will not be in the end of season play-offs in England’s top-tier after the defeat to Newcastle. It has been coming, with the Tigers’ form declining over the years, but a late surge has always saved their campaign. Not this time around as a run of five consecutive victories has been followed by successive home defeats and, after Wasps’ triumph over Northampton Saints, they can only finish as high as fifth. For the Premiership’s most successful club it has been a disappointing few years, who expect to be among the best, both domestically and in Europe.

Lyon: They are still in a good position in the Top 14 and will expect to get the job done at home to Montpellier, but Pierre Mignoni’s team were woeful against strugglers Oyonnax on Saturday and, even if they qualify for the play-offs, this 39-18 reverse could come back to haunt them. After Toulon’s dominant victory over Castres, Lyon will have to go away in the barrages and, as their performance showed on Saturday, their form on their travels has not been great recently.

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