Glaws can't allow this to happen again
By Cherry Picker
May 21 2008
Gloucester have had time to digest the indigestible after the frustrating play-off defeat at the hands of Leicester Tigers at the weekend. The blame has been apportioned, the anger has died down (a little) and now it’s time to start asking what can be done to make sure this sort of thing doesn’t happen again. The problem is, Dean Ryan has lost some of his enthusiasm for the job.
After last weekend, he’s not the only one!
Glaws have now suffered frustrating play-off setbacks two years on the bounce, first at Twickenham in the final then at Kingsholm in the semi. And to say that nobody likes it is an understatement.
Ryan (right) has taken some of the flak that’s been flying around after the game, though questions posed about his future at the club on the Shedloads message board have quickly been dismissed by the majority of fans.
So it’s up to him to sort it out so that next season isn’t as frustrating as the last two have been, taking the club to the very brink of success then failing at the last, or second last, hurdle.
This is what Ryan told the Citizen after the Tigers flop: "I thought we were very poor and we got what we deserved.
"It's not how I take responsibility, the side has to front up and recognise the choices that it's made, the things it did that caused us to lose the game.
"There's nowhere to shove it and say we are too young, we aren't physical enough - the responsibility lies in what we did in that 80 minutes.
"We can't put the whole thing on the back of Tindall because that's a cop-out for the people we've got at nine and 10, a cop-out for people we've got at 12 and 13 and anywhere else.
"It's a cop-out to say Tins is injured so we lost some of our smartness. We know what to do. We spent 70 minutes without Tins last week and we knew what to do.
"That's the transition for this group - whether it wants to come to terms with that or whether we hide behind what we should have done in the last two minutes, that's not the key.
"It's what we had out there - we should and could have quite easily won that game.
"I've lost a bit of enthusiasm myself. For a side to move forward it can't continue to be a side being told what to do. That's where this side is at.
"It either stays okay for nine months of the season being told what to do or it takes responsibility for its actions and whether it can deliver on the big occasions.
"We've done that for the last two weeks but we've been very on script. Today we had none of that."
In our humble opinion, Dean, what you need is a leader in the pack. It hurts to say it, but would players like Martin Jlohnson or Lawrence Dallaglio have allowed the Tigers defeat to happen?
| MEANWHILE, Glaws will have three players in the Barbarians team against Ireland at Kingsholm next Tuesday. |
| Lesley Vainikolo, Iain Balshaw and Patrice Collazo all play, and for Collazo it will be his last game at Kingsholm at the end of his six years as a Glaws player. |
I have always been against the play-off system in the Premiership - in my view, the decision to introduce the play-offs was wrong; the decision to give the title of English Champions to the winner of the play-offs was, is and always will be wrong. If you finish top, you are the champions - this is not a difficult concept to grasp, afterall it still applies in the round ball leagues, so it must be easy to understand!
The present system is effectivly an insult to the team who finish top on two counts:
1. You get nothing for all of the work that your team puts in put in over the previous 22 games of the season,
2. As Wasps fans are quick to point out, you know the rules at the start of the season and you only need to finish in the top four; this implies that (this year, again) Gloucester have been allowed, by mutual consent of the other high-flyers in the GP, to finish top - and more the fool you for trying!
Unfortunately, the system is not only entrenched as the Grand Finale to the season, but most clubs voted in favour of it (without checking my facts, I think only Leicester and London Irish voted against - I am sure someone will correct me if this is wrong).
After Sunday's game, I mentioned to a Gloucester fan that, if we, the fans are serious about voicing our concerns about the fairness or otherwise of the play-offs, what is needed is a grass-roots petition to the RFU.Sadly, I do not think there is enough support throughout the GP - I am sure we can all think of at least one club who are certainly all in favour of the play-off system!
I don't want to say 'you only have yourselves to blame', but I just did!! The starting point to get the system reversed to 1st passed the post has to be your own club - without that support, you have no chance, and even with it - you will stand virtually no chance.
The only practical thing to do is to get used to it, play the system, take your chances and hope that someday, some semblance sanity will return to the premiership rugby.
The play-offs are big money spinners - "up-hill struggle" does not even begin to describe the task of getting them dropped.
Whether it was wise to be that honest is another question.
I bet he'll be revved up again come pre-season, fired by the anger.
)Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2008:05:23:18:32:36 by Ian B.
Gloucester is a fine club with strong traditions and achievements on the past and I am sure you are building for another era of high results.
Look at Bath - how many years did they dominate English rugby? but until this season they have been working their way back up.
Unlike many Tigers fans who regard this season as unacceptably poor, I am just pleased it wasn't worse!