The Black Army

It was quite fitting that Llantrisant Rugby Club should end the season with a match that reflects their season; a game of two halves.

A fair crowd turned up at Sardis Road and thanks to the incompetent guidance of twelve Pontypridd RFC officials it only took twenty minutes to park. On a sun-drenched Tuesday evening, the players were the envy of many because without a breath of wind, a firm but forgiving pitch and glorious sunshine they were given something that many of us go our careers without experiencing; perfect playing conditions (pictured left).

The opening exchanges belonged to The Black Army and had the parking attendants demonstrated as much spatial awareness as the players on the pitch, the supporters probably wouldn’t be placed on the waiting list for a parking spot despite ample availability. Harry Rees was the first to make inroads as he ran off the shoulder of Jonny Williams on the halfway line. Rees barnstormed his way into the Senghenydd 22 but slack handling cost Llantrisant the imminent try.

This would be the last of the Senghenydd 22 that The Black Army would see for the rest of the first half as The Saints completely dominated territory and possession. Senghenydd’s first visit into the Llantrisant half saw them return with points as James Hallett slotted a penalty over from 44m on the angle for the first points of the evening. Lewys Montague answered straight back for Llantrisant to level the scores at 3-3 with a penalty of his own.

The Saints then applied an onslaught on Llantrisant’s line and had their finishing been more clinical it’s safe to say that The Black Army would have been well and truly beaten before the halftime whistle had even sounded. Twice on the near touchline the Aber Valley outfit butchered golden opportunities and they could quite easily have found themselves way out in front, instead they had to settle for another 3 points from a Hallett penalty.

It was at this stage that the referee decided to make the final all about him. His first questionable decision was to sin bin the Senghenydd second row for an infringement at the breakdown. The ball was already slow for Glenn Holloway and despite the penalty being conceded 40m out and on the touchline, referee Greg Morgan had deemed it worthy of a yellow card. Almost immediately afterwards, he must’ve realised he’d made a mistake because he evened the decision out by sending Simon Williams to the bin for a perfectly legitimate turnover. Not only that but it was the first penalty Llantrisant had conceded at the breakdown all game; the fracas had started. From the resulting penalty, James Hallett stretched his team’s lead to 6 and it was the start of yet another siege upon Llantrisant’s try line.

Senghenydd reverted back to their strength, that of creating perfect scoring opportunities and finding a way to sabotage them; much like Mosese Luveitasau Yabakitini used to do for the Cardiff Blues. By now, this disease had spread through the whole team because the earlier-reliable Hallett was now missing straightforward chances at goal too, further letting the under-performing Black Army off the hook. There was an air of inevitability about the opening try of the game and it was the unfortunate Montague who gifted Senghenydd the opportunity. The fullback spilled the ball behind his own line as he looked to clear his lines for the umpteenth time. From the resulting scrum James Carmichael rumbled his way over, carrying the back row over with him. James Hallett found his kicking boots after 3 wayward attempts and slotted the conversion to take the score to 16-3.

Llantrisant seemed unable to keep hold of the ball and began to cough up possession almost every phase of play. This prompted a change from the coaches, not in personnel but their vantage point. Gareth Alexander and Huw Jones had started the game right at the back of the stand, but gradually this setup changed. Firstly, Huw Jones, known as the voice of reason; the calmer member of the coaching staff made his way down to the dugout to try and alter the way his team were playing. This left Gareth Alexander aka Urban to his own devices at the back of the stand and following the try he uncharacteristically lost the plot and in a blur of arm-waving and obscenities he joined Huw Jones at pitchside where said arm-waving and obscenities continued. Unfortunately, the coaches’ presence on the touchline didn’t change the fortunes of the players on the pitch as Senghenydd closed the half with another penalty, leaving the score 19-3 at the break. Despite the efforts of Matthew Griffiths who looked sharp in attack and Ben Coombs who had carried and defended tirelessly throughout the half, the Division 2 team simply couldn’t get a foothold in the game.

Thankfully, the halftime team talk couldn’t be heard from the stands, but whatever was said had worked because as was the case in the first half, the opening exchanges were all Llantrisant’s. They managed to keep hold of the ball for a number of patient phases inside the opposition 22 which lead to the prominent Simon Williams going over for a try from close range. The resulting conversion from Montague was charged down but The Black Army were back in it at 19-8.

In a complete change of fortune, it was now Llantrisant who were in control of the possession and territory and Senghenydd were now feeling the wrath of referee Morgan’s whistle. Julian Andrews was now offering himself as a carrier time and again as he valiantly carried the attack to the opposition. Montague slotted a straightforward penalty to bring the scores to 19-11 and then a few minutes later he knocked a similar kick over to bring his team to within one score at 19-14. The Army were now firmly in the driving seat. Having seen a long-range effort drop under the bar, Montague was faced with a tricky kick 36m out following another infringement at the breakdown. He showed maturity beyond his years as he dissected the posts once more to bring Llantrisant to within one kick of the lead.

Llantrisant launched another attack and with the referee holding out his arm for an advantage, Sean Gilbertson went over the try line only to drop the ball. Play was brought back and Montague again knocked over the kick to give his team the lead for the first time in the game.

The Rhondda-based outfit were now faced with the task of closing the game out. Senghenydd managed to sneak their way into their opposition’s half and upon this rare visit (pictured left), they were awarded with a penalty 42m out. With Hallett now off the field, it was down to Senghenydd’s second-choice kicker to put his team into a 2 point lead; which he did with aplomb.

The final minutes were probably the best of the game with both teams neglecting their kicking games in an attempt to keep hold of the ball. With most of the play taking place between the two teams’ 22s, discipline was of the essence. It proved to be one breakdown too many for Gareth Short as he couldn’t resist a foolish play at the ball on the floor. This act of idiocy gave Montague a shot at the win from 44m and back-rower Short would watch the remainder of the game from the sideline having received a yellow card. Fortunately for him, the penalty was scuffed and his side remained in front.

With the clock past 80 minutes, Llantrisant threw one last desperate attack at their opposition’s line. Proving that he’d been watching a lot of television this year and that he was probably being paid commission for yellow cards, another Senghenydd player was making his way to the sideline for a dubious tip-tackle on the ever-present Simon Williams. With Montague pulling up with cramp, the season had gone full circle and it was down to Jonny Williams to take the last kick of the game from just outside the 22. Just as we’d seen in the early stages of the season, he confidently struck the ball clean through the posts; giving Llantrisant the victory 22-23.

It’s a shame that the travelling Senghenydd supporters weren’t as gracious in defeat as their players. The small pocket of supporters really let themselves down by coming onto the pitch when the game had finished specifically to ironically applaud the referee and his assistants as they collected their medals. Others decided that it would be a good idea to make turkey noises at the Llantrisant kickers as they aimed at goal. Ironically, their season is likely to resemble a turkey next year. They’ll live an ugly existence and their dry, tasteless nature will offend almost everyone, they’ll spend September to December getting taken advantage of by the bigger turkeys, they’ll get stuffed around Christmas and eventually thrown away and forgotten by the New Year.

As mentioned before, the final mirrored The Black Army’s season and the classic sporting cliché; a game of two halves. Llan started the season indifferently and were the epitome of mid-table mediocrity. The turning point of the season was the departure of two players; Huw Williams and myself. We left after the 25-25 draw away at Ynysybwl, since then the only game we’ve lost as a first team was the friendly away to Premiership outfit Pontypridd. Towards the end of the season, I was fortunate enough to be involved in the final league match of our campaign away at Ystrad Rhondda. Predictably, given my presence, we lost. But although the time I spent on the pitch was short lived, it did produce seven points. Therefore, theoretically if I’d have spent the whole 80 minutes on the wing impersonating a fast person, we’d have won 1,120-0. Seeing as we’re on statistics, here’s some more for you. In my debut season for The Black Army, I played 13 games scoring exactly 100 points. In the games where I was involved, we won four, lost 8 and drew one. On average, we scored 17 points per game and conceded 22. In the 13 games, discounting bonus points, there were 44 points on offer; we took just 18 points from these games and we got knocked out in the first round of two cup competitions. As soon as I left, in all competitive matches, the first team played 7 and won 7, taking 24 points from a possible 24 and winning a cup final. Furthermore, we averaged 28 points a game and conceded 16 when I wasn’t in the team. Probably won’t be putting that on my rugby CV. Just be thankful that I selflessly injured myself before the final, completely avoiding any sort of involvement whatsoever.

Had the first half of the season matched the second, we’d been right in the shake-up for promotion. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be, but the way the boys performed in the closing stages of the season should give them infinite confidence going into next year. With the top 4 teams leaving the division and no-one coming down from above, there isn’t anyone to fear next year.

Hopefully, the only difference at Cefn Mabely next year will be the results, nothing else needs to change. On the field, the lineout needs to function like it did in the final and not revert back to the mid-winter monstrosity that it was under the glazed-over watch of Huw Williams. The scrum should remain solid with the introduction of Shrek who seems to me to be made out of a tree. He should definitely carry on eating toddlers or whatever it is that he does to be that big. Kieron Evans needs to keep goal-hanging which will in turn make Harry Rees angry; no one wants to tackle an angry Harry Rees. Glenn Holloway should marshal his troops as he has done all year and maybe work on a miss 12 as opposed to this year’s miss 10. For team morale, let’s hope that Sean Gilbertson has got another year in him because when he gets knocked out, it’s a nice get-together for the rest of the team while he has a little sleep, lazy bastard.

Next year’s success way well hinge on that man Jason Alford. With fresh faces in the league there will be plenty of wingers that he’ll be able to mercilessly berate, good luck to him and even more luck to the wingers. Alex James definitely needs to keep tackling everything that moves, although maybe the club could invest in a steel-enforced number 7 shirt seeing as he manages to turn every jersey he wears into a cheeky off-the-shoulder number by the time he comes off the pitch. Monty needs to buy himself a CD of farm animal noises so that he can train his mind to for the trip to Senghenydd and keep kicking like a machine. One area of improvement, though. So to avoid falling short with those long-range efforts, eat a few pasties a week to fill that right leg, forget what nutritionalists will tell you; weight is good.

On the training paddock, it’s vital that Urban continues to wear shorts on his head, the only difference being that there should be 28 people laughing at him, not just 8. If Gareth Alexander is the bad cop, Huw Jones is certainly the good cop and he needs to continue to implement a positive, free-flowing brand of rugby; despite Urban wanting to keep it in the forwards. I’ll let you two fight that one out, I’m not getting involved. Ian Worgan absolutely needs to continue to be the finest, keenest, loudest and funniest touch rugby player in the Northern Hemisphere while Owen ‘Spud’ Bater continues his reign as the world’s worst. It’s good to see that Spud’s time away from the game is not being wasted. His seminars on ‘How to make Gareth Alexander snap’ have sometimes been better attended than training sessions, but one man is top of the class. Martyn Griffiths is Owen Bater in the making. Where Spud uses the more conventional verbal annoyance, his protégé is far more inconspicuous but ultimately produces the same result. Eggy has adopted the pragmatic approach of completely ignoring the rules set out by Urban in training matches. His favourite trick is competing for the ball at the ruck despite his coach specifically telling him not to. In one training session following such an infringement, Urban huddled the team together and addressed them with a message regarding his new nemesis. Seeing as it’s a family club, I’ve altered some of the words,

            “If that stunt puts his ducking hands on the stunting ball again, kick him in the ducking head. I don’t care if you kill the stunt, ducking stamp on his stunting head.”

Thankfully, he didn’t do it again. One thing the club could invest in is sending Headlock on a refereeing course, we all know why; no need to elaborate on that point. It’s really important that Ian Wharton keeps wearing the most haggard training gear the game has ever seen, especially in the muddier months of December and January. Jamie Joyce definitely needs to keep maintaining with the juice because it’s only a matter of time before he’s the biggest man in the club. Leon needs to keep attending his Jamaican sprint camp over the summer, though maybe this year he could take Scott Dean with him. As legendary as the ‘slow & go’ is, if Beany could gain a yard of pace, we’d see more of those glorious swan dives on facebook. Cameron Doster will be completing a series of experiments prepared by NASA in an attempt to transplant the muscles in his face to his legs. Doster’s problem is illustrated below with what he looks like now and what he’d look like if the rest of his body matched the muscle mass in his face.

It’s a common problem known as truckface and among the high-profile sufferers are Ceri Sweeney and rugby league’s Brent Tate. If for some reason the experiment isn’t a success, his brother Aaron is on standby to receive the excess jawline so that e can add hit to his comparatively chinless face; yet more evidence of his wisdom.

Off the field, there are many things that need to remain a constant. The Thursday night quiz should probably be televised in a QI-type production. Morph would of course be Stephen Fry, albeit a slightly shorter but equally camp version. Duke, Jack and Tarvy would be on the panel and sitting in Alan Davies’ coveted seat would be the one and only Lee Austin. It’s a shame that University Challenge doesn’t branch out, because a Llantrisant Rugby Football Club quartet of Lee Austin, Rhys Ferris, Sean Stephens and Jamie Joyce could quite rightly be on pay-per-view. It’s also quite important that the David brothers keep looking alike so that I can keep calling them by their siblings’ names.

There’s one area of the club that may well hold the key to the future of Llantrisant Rugby Football Club; twitter. Lee Kerslake’s work as the club’s twitter publicity officer is relentless and it’s a matter of time until Lord Alan Sugar reveals himself as The Black Army’s biggest fan. It’s a fluid and diverse place, though despite #llantwittant only being a few months old, it’s already seen some changes. You may recall that Rhys Ferris was once hailed as the king of twitter, but it was one incriminating photo too many for his relationship to withstand and he disgracefully turned his back on the twitter universe. It’s left many followers of @the_ferret in disarray, and many of his biggest fans publicly displayed their disapproval in the wake of his departure.

@mrgayuk wrote:       such a shame to see him gone, his photos really brightened up my day. #nomoreboners L

@nancyboy2 and @uphillgardener both retweeted this.

            @the_dirt_tracker wrote: where am i going to get cheeky snaps of a man                                                          in a beany showing just enough shaft so that it’s ok for me to set it as my work desktop                                                                 background from now? #nothappy

Both @briandowling and @fudgepacker favourited this.

His fan-base feel well and truly let down, but they needn’t fear because a new man is on his way. He’s currently in a relationship which has seen him slip down the top perve rankings, topped obviously by Jonny Williams. Despite being in love, Monty still has the common courtesy of posting pictures of himself in his pants and it’s a matter of time before he’s following in the footsteps of the late and great Rhys Ferris.

(Monty’s “come get me, boys” pose.)

The youth team this year have excelled on and off the pitch. Winning the league in the fashion that they did is a remarkable achievement and it’s a testiment to their togetherness. I’m sure they owe much to their fearless leader Sean Stephens, who despite falling short on personal hygiene, has proved himself to be an admirable skipper. Look out, Glenn. The club is in great hands going forward, though if Elliot Jones has any aspirations, he’ll need to have a wash; because his face still smells like arse after an unfortunate incident after the Penarth game.

After the traditional boat races and 6 halves, the Penarth captain singled Elliot out as the Llan player in the best shape, narrowly edging out Shitty. He was the challenged to complete the ultimate sit-up. Keen as mustard, he ripped his top off and joined two Penarth players, one either side of him in the sit-up position. They linked arms and legs and on the count of three Elliot attempted the ultimate sit-up. As he strained to get up off the floor, the Penarth players held him down and the helpless scrum-half was a sitting duck as a bare arse came down upon his face.

A number of members rained down upon Chernobyl in Northern Ukraine last weekend. Thanks to the Football European Championships kicking off in a few weeks, the price of a pint trebled to a staggering £1.20. With a kitty of £6,000, that equates to 5,000 pints; meaning each touring member would have 156 pints to consume. Had the tourists traveled last year, the price of a pint was 33p; that’s 18,182 pintsm, an astonishing 586 pints each. Probably for the best, otherwise it would have meant the majority of Llanrisant RFC relocating to Eastern Europe and not just Jamie Coleman. He was last seen at the airport, but managed to get himself lost in the departure lounge. Despite holding the aircraft for 45 minutes, there was still no sign of him and the touring party were forced to leave their comrade behind. Sources close to Coleman say that he’s met a delightful girl called Erika. She bottles milk in the local dairy farm and they’re currently looking to buy a city centre property to open a milkshake shop. Good luck to them both.

The club has got a lot of things right and the foundation is there to achieve great things next season. It’s a proper rugby club with the emphasis on the right things thanks to the committee. It all fits together nicely, however, there are a few things that need to change if the club is going to evolve and reach its potential:

1. Ryan Harrison has got to stop wearing that stupid scrumcap.
2. Huw Williams needs to be monitored on a Friday night.
3. Lee Austin needs to follow through with his promise and get on the gear; that can only end well.
4. New players should be given a welcome pack to draw their attention to Flyer’s thumbs, Urban’s temperament and Jason Alford as a whole.
5. Sean Stephens needs to check into rehab before it’s too late.
6. Karl Groves should be made to attend therapeutic spa sessions on Tuesday lunchtimes so that he doesn’t come to training wanting to kill us.
7. Someone needs to tell Simon Williams that he is actually allowed to catch the ball with two hands in the lineout, I’m not telling him though, he’s massive.
8. Rhys Ferris should be forced to return to #llantwittant, I’ve wasted a fortune on him already buying digital channel 824 for FerrisTV, sealing a deal with publishers for The Ferret Magazine, purchasing the domain rhysferris.com and getting Dan Brown to agree to write the book The Ferret. The least he can do is return.
9. Ben Coombs’ passport needs to be confiscated so he doesn’t do something silly like go back to Afghanistan; there’s plenty of people to shoot in this country.
10. Kieron Evans needs to use some of his personal stash of fertilizer on the [itch so that it doesn’t end up looking like a scene from Band of Brothers.
11. Guy Griffiths should be made a recruitment scout for the Vale of Glamorgan, with many players showing an interest of joining The Black Army from the region.
12. Matthew Griffiths should probably look at changing his pre-match routine, possibly cutting down from 12 to 6 fags.
13. The calls ‘scrumpo’ and ‘scrumball’ should absolutely be changed. Having called both moves at least 20 times, I still have no idea which is which and on the pitch it’s a gamble as to which one has been called anyway. I just drift out wide and hope Glenn passes to someone else.
14. Dafydd Israel needs to stop wearing factor 60 all year round because he’s on the verge of becoming see-through.
15. Andrew Thomas needs to work on culturing his left foot because at the moment it resembles a 48-year-old man in Mallorca with a pint of Carlsberg in one hand, fish & chips in the other, watching Bolton V Blackburn on a big screen whilst wearing an England shirt with ‘Dave 66’ on the back, a trilby, socks and sandals.
16. Flyer for President, not of the club; but the world.

Once again gentlemen, it’s been a pleasure.