London Welsh v Worcester Preview

By Mark W-J
May 1 2013

London Welsh bring down the curtain on our debut season in the Aviva Premiership with the visit of our old friends, Worcester. We have faced the Warriors more often than any other top-flight club - this will be the 20th meeting - and no team has inflicted more defeats on the Welsh in of league rugby. That’s a sobering thought as we reflect on our worst season - statistically - in over 100 years.

It’s a measure of the hopes and expectations of our two clubs that despite our impending relegation - which can only be avoided if Bedford were to a) win the Championship play-offs and b) fail to overturn the ruling of the Professional Game Board with regard to the Minimum Standards Criteria audit - our Head Coach, Lyn Jones, has been nominated as Premier Rugby’s QBE Director of Rugby of the Season, whereas his counterpart at Sixways, Richard Hill, was relieved of his duties once his club’s Premiership status had been assured for another season. For once the Worcester faithful were shocked by a decision to sack the coach at the end of another season of (relative) underachievement, with the Warriors showing real signs of improvement pre-Christmas as they reached the halfway stage in 9^th place, with fewer points separating them from the then leaders, Harlequins, than the mid-season basement club, Sale Sharks. But, like Welsh, the wheels have fallen off since Christmas, and while we’ve suffered a club record eleven consecutive league defeats Worcester have won just once - at home to Wasps on 1^st March - since they beat us at Sixways in round eleven, four days before Christmas. Saturday’s game brings together the only Premiership club who haven’t collected a try bonus all season and the only team without an away win - although no London Welsh fan will need reminding that Worcester have won our last 18 meetings. Despite having won only one game on the road in total during their last three Premiership campaigns, they have collected more points away from home than London Irish this season, courtesy of five losing bonus points and one try bonus. They have scored four tries on three separate occasions, compared to just seven times in total in their first seven seasons in the top flight, and nobody can match their eight losing bonus points this term.

Paul Warwick for Stade against Warriors
in the 2011/12 Amlin Cup

Overall, therefore, you might conclude that Hill was close to getting things right, but with a host of players having announced their intention to move to pastures new after this weekend - including Andy Goode, Joe Carlisle and Matt Mullan to Wasps, Blair Cowan to London Irish, Andy Short and Errie Claassens to Bristol and Aleki Lutui to Edinburgh - the board made a decision to act. On the one hand it must be galling to see players depart for clubs who, on paper at least, are not significantly better than Worcester - although results this weekend could see them finish in 11^th place they have been ahead of Irish and within touching distance of Wasps for most of the season - yet it is also strange that Hill had been allowed to recruit some fairly decent looking replacements, not least Paul Warwick from Stade Francais and Argentinian internationals Ignacio Mieres and Agustin Creevy from Exeter and Montpelier respectively. The speed with which Dean Ryan was unveiled as his successor raised a few eyebrows and the club have announced further changes to the management structure which they hope will deliver success in the not-too-distant future. Since they won promotion to the Premiership in 2003-04 Worcester have watched jealously as thirteen English clubs have competed in the Heineken Cup, including Newcastle, Leeds, Bristol and Exeter: indeed, during the last decade only two clubs have played Premiership rugby but not qualified for Europe’s blue riband competition - you guessed it; Worcester and London Welsh.

As previously mentioned, whether we win or lose on Saturday this season will represent our worst return (in terms of percentage of games won) since the 19^th Century. Victory would boost our record to seven wins from 34 games (20.6%) whereas a 28^th loss of the season would see that ratio drop to just 17.6%. The 47-28 reverse at London Irish a fortnight ago was our thirteenth consecutive away defeat, beating a record that has stood for 90 years. Yet, perversely, finishing as the twelfth best club side in England represents our best ever ranking in league rugby, and we can take pride in the fact that, with one game remaining, we have scored more points than Sale. We have scored fewer tries than any other club (26) but that is the same as Newcastle managed in 22 games last season, while Worcester scored only 23 times in each of their last two full Premiership campaigns and Sale just 24 when they avoided relegation at the Warriors’ expense in 2009-10. Our 379 points scored is better than four clubs - Newcastle, Wasps, Worcester and Bath - scored last season, and represents the highest number of points scored by a relegated club since Harlequins’ 416 in 2004-05.

Goodbye to the Kassam Stadium?
Our base for the 12/13 season but probably not yet 'home'

As we bid farewell to the Premiership, to (probably) Stadiwm Kassam and (possibly) Oxford we have one final chance to salute the efforts of the players and coaches. Despite the disappointment surrounding the overall playing record and inevitable relegation, everyone associated with the club can be incredibly proud of their achievements on the field, at least. This season has seen both Matt Corker and Jon Mills overtake Chris Ritchie’s record of 128 league appearances - they have now worn the scarlet jersey on 144 and 134 occasions respectively - while Gordon Ross’s 160 points, which put him seventh in the Premiership charts for the season, have moved him up to third in our list on 491, overtaking Dylan Pugh and Aled Thomas but still behind Andy Lee (612) and Craig Raymond (916). It’s no secret that even the most optimistic of supporters expected us to be relegated; the more pessimistic (realistic?) among us even anticipated a complete whitewash of 22 defeats. While it is difficult to single out any individual, it’s possibly no coincidence that we haven’t won a game since Hudson Tonga’uiha was injured in the opening ten minutes of our game with London Irish five months ago, and you have to wonder what might have happened had we been able to field our strongest XV consistently throughout the season.

While Hudson and talismanic skipper Jon Mills have signed for another two years, we will bid farewell on Saturday to several players who have been central to the cause this term. Neil Briggs, Tom Arscott and Krill Kulemin are all leaving after just one season, the former to Leicester and the latter pair to Sale, while Ed Jackson (last year’s Supporters’ Club Player of the Year) is making the short move to Wasps. Paulica Ion, who has spent this season on-loan from London Irish, will be demonstrating his supreme scrummaging prowess in the toughest of environments, France’s Top14, where he will be playing for Perpignan, and Adam Brown (last year’s Players’ Player of the Year) is returning to Newport, where he expected to be joined by Lee Beach. There are plenty of other rumours - not least surrounding Gavin Henson’s next move - and it’s highly likely that there will be considerably more moves over the summer months. Last, but by no means least, we should pay tribute to Kelvin Bryon. Although the circumstances of his departure may have left a bad taste, it shouldn’t be allowed to overshadow his tremendous contribution to London Welsh over the last 20 years, and no matter what hurdles we may have to face in the coming months you have to remember where we were and how far we have come under his stewardship.

Jon Mills
A captain who has never failed to lead by example

Finally, after four seasons, 131 matches and somewhere in the region of 160,000 words, I can confirm that this will be my last match preview for Dragons’ Den. Thank you to everybody who has taken time to read them, although I should especially like to mention Derek, who has embarrassed me on more than one occasion with his effusive praise, and also the mysterious ‘DD’ for giving me a platform to share my statistical analysis and all-round nerdiness. Maybe see you back on the duckboards in September…

London Welsh v Worcester Preview

Posted by: The Dragons' Den (IP Logged)

Date: 01/05/2013 13:04

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