Friday, 18 June 2010 14:41

 

 

 

Injury Shock Horror for the men in pink

 

Even as the team travelled to the match venue, injury struck at the heart of the team. Gorgeous George suffered an eye strain when he found out that Gilly was wearing the wrong shade of Khaki. Strangely enough he also suffered a groin strain getting of the train. 

 

Rugby

 

On match day  our front row who were looking really fresh after their early morning sessions , and were only too eager to lead us into the fray.

The cunning organisers had put us on first up so it was straight into the changing room and into the intensive warm up. After 20 minutes of warm up, we were informed that our opponents were running late. This killed the teams pent up aggression and Crawfie immediately went into meditation mode or unconsciousness as we call it

 

 

We played Hamburger RFC in the reorganised first match and were going reasonably well considering the majority of the team had their minds elsewhere or just running around in a semi drunk fug.

I mean to say when does a touring team even gets up out of bed before 1 pm never mind start a match.

Then the wheels came off ,Colin ( 1st match in 5 years) Duncan pulled the hamstring, Gorgeous George came off with his groin and they buggers scored in the 4^th minute of injury time in the 1^st half.

Half time Hamburger RFC 7.0 Academy 0

We started the second half well, having reorganised the team , slipped on a German for George and were looking good and then Captain Davis was struck down suddenly with a big toe injury.

All the sporting stars get metatarsal injuries. our star player is helped off with a sore big toe.

We looked good in phases but we went down with Gareth ‘best back row I’ve ever played with’ Hodges scoring late on to make the score Hamburger 17 Academy 5

 

 

The team were shell shocked and probably sobering up especially when there was no beer. This was the longest time many had gone without a beer for 2 days. The team retired to shaded grove where Gilly merely struck up a Zen like Buddha pose.

 

As a warm up to our last game, the guys played in an over 35 match for HBV92 Berlin.

These guys have got the rules right

            Uncontested scrums

            Nobody allowed to run more than 20 metres or its a penalty

The Bird was rejuvenated and even the Cat had a smile on their face

 

We faced the younger version of the Berlin team in our last match. We had entered the transfer market in the interim to snaffle a few Hamburger players into our back line to replace our injured souls.

We got off to a shocker start and were 7 – 0 down in the first minutes and then went 12 – 0 down after Maximillian, the Italian/German went walkabout.

The boys wised up and with Phil ‘ the mouth’ Ingram stealing lineout ball , we used are graeter technical nous and slowed the game down and kept the ball. Wilsy “The ginger sorry Strawberry blond” scrum half tried to reprise his old reverse spin pass. (If anything slightly less bad that it was years ago). It hit Crawfie and woke him up and he caught it and led a forward rush and with the line open, a blatantly offside Berliner intercepted and ran the length of pitch and scored.

Half time 17 – 0

This really pissed someone off because straight from the restart we unleashed a serious of attacks which and we struck back with the boys setting the young speedy backs ( Germans) up with plenty of ball from which Maximaillian and Lucas scored a couple of tries to bring it back to 17 -12.

Alas again the Berliners got the ball from a blatantly offside position and extended their lead to 24 -12. The referee ( English) obvious did not like playing off side in the backs. Maybe a bit complicated for him

The team went back at them and as the changes rolled on and off, including the first ever substitution requested by the ladies on the touchline for Hodgey, We again got back into the game with a third try to bring the score back to 24 -17. Alas the clock beat the boys but old man ran the young guy really close.

The last match against Koln was a wonder to behold,  We played with grace and imagination and the years seemly to fall from our guys as strutted their stuff.  Both cat and I agree that it was probably the best rugby ever played by Academy against foreign opposition.

You had to be there to see  and that includes Koln rugby club

So we finished the tournament in 3 rd place and won the first silver ware of the season to present to new president Carlo.

 

 

 

Social Events

 

The whole tour party can all agree,

1.     Wilsy hasn’t changed at all.

2.     He hasn’t wised up

3.     Still as mad as a hatter

From meeting the advance guard at the airport with a little snorter he had everyday planned out for us.

Day 1

Cultural trip, beer , beer ,beer ,something else ,beer, beer in a different park, beer in a car park with sand, Food –what’s that, beer oblivion

 

Day 2

Sightseeing on the river with beer, cultural walk , beer ,more beer, lots more beer, look here is the rest of them- more beer , train . beer , Crawfie first appearance since last night . more beer.  Rugby club , beer, more beer , oblivion

And so it went on

 

 

 There must be a fine due   – no Reisepass on show

 

                                                                       

                                                         

   Wilsy            Tour leader

The Hamburger people were really good to us and they were not frightened by us on Saturday at the 60^th anniversary function

I want to thank Wilsy for his efforts and also to thank Hamburger RFC for hosting us. They did us proud.

 

 

There are lots of great moments on the tour but only those of us on Tour will know them.

 

If you want to hear about them sign up for next year’s tour – Lanzarote !!  maybe

 

The Management

Last Photo

We actually looked like a team 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Until next year       The Management