Preview: Leeds' Great Escape?

Injured still...
By apb
April 29 2005

Its been emotionally draining being a Leeds fan this year. Six weeks ago the team were dead and buried, consigned to the ignominy of relegation to the National Leagues without having stayed long enough to receive the full central funding allocation from the Premiership.

But since that time, a magnificent transformation has occurred, and a winning ethos has ground out results (as well as some pretty impressive ones as well). The win on Tuesday against Quins finally dragged the club off the bottom of the premiership, and with one game to go, the job of a magnificent "Great Escape" has almost been done.

However, lets not be too complacent. The tunnel that Dickie Attenborough had Charles Bronson digging ended up thirty feet short of safety. When that amount of planning goes into an effort, a silly mistake like being thirty feet short of the wire jeopardises the whole mission. Fortunately, Steve McQueen was thinking straight and was able to rig up a signalling system that allow many of the men to get into the woods. Disaster avoided!

Later on, Gordon Jackson fell for the oldest trick in the book, by not thinking straight. The German officer inspecting his passport engaged him in conversation in fluent German, and then, just as he was off, "Good Luck". "Thanks!" says Gordon, and immediately the cover was blown.

All the escaping British and American actors were rounded up and shot. Of the 77 escaping actors, only 27 were returned back to the camp.

"Hold up, APB!", I hear you all saying! "That's a bit off topic, innit?". Well, frankly yes, but the point really is that, Dickie and the boys thought they had everything covered, and while they were not conplacent about their ultimate goal of escape, they forgot the basics at the critical moments, and all the hard work leading up to the escape was wasted. Worse, since many of the escapees were never seen again.

So, Leeds are there at the moment, thirty feet from the proverbial woods, hopefully continuing to dig their own escape tunnel all the way, rather than relax assuming it'll all be done for them by other teams. They need to keep the pressure on, remember the basics, and don't fall for the old tricks. If they do that, then the Swiss Border is there for the crossing, into the glorious town of Zurich (geddit?) for another year....

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Teams:

Leeds

15. Diego Albanese
14. Andre Snyman
13. Phil Christophers
12. Chris Bell
11. Tom Biggs
10. Gordon Ross
9. Alan Dickens
1. Mike Shelley
2. Mark Regan
3. Gavin Kerr
4. Stuart Hooper (c)
5. Scott Morgan
6. Colm Rigney
7. Richard Parks
8. Alix Popham

16. Matt Holt
17. Rob Rawlinson
18. Jon Dunbar
19. Dan Hyde
20. Mark McMillan
21. Craig McMullen
22. David Rees

Bath

15. Matt Perry
14. Andy Williams
13. Tom Cheeseman
12. Olly Barkley
11. Frikkie Welsh
10. Chris Malone
9. Martyn Wood
1. David Barnes
2. Jonathan Humphreys (c)
3. Duncan Bell
4. James Hudson
5. Danny Grewcock
6. Geraint Lewis
7. James Scaysbrook
8. Gareth Delve

16. Lee Mears
17. David Flatman
18. Chris Goodman
19. Rob Fidler
20. Andy Higgins
21. Nick Walshe
22. Ryan Davis

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