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Fri 25 Jun 2021
Societe Generale Valley RFC
Rugby Men Nags (Vets 40+)
19:30
Vets 10-a-side
Nags not Cut Out for Ten-a-Side Shenanigans

Nags not Cut Out for Ten-a-Side Shenanigans

Grant Beuzeval26 Jun 2021 - 05:36
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Knackered Nags way too knackered to field a full team but rugby was the winner in this season finale

Where to begin, dear Reader?

This season should have ended a month ago for your heroes, the Valley Knackered Nags, after their trophy winning performance against the Timeworn Tigers in the Vets League Grand Final at King’s Park but the sheer volume of Tsingtao consumed by the Nags at the bequest of Justin “nobody’s going home ‘til all this piss is drunk” Temara after that match, led the enterprising tournament organisers to avidly spin off one last Tens Tournament to boost the booze sales before the Kings Park clubhouse is shuttered for the summer.

Anyway, to cut a long story, five teams turned up at KP for one last hoorah, seeing off the wretched 2020/21 season. Surprisingly, the recent rains had cooled the air and conditions were pleasant for “open running rugby” – a term now synonymous with veterans rugby across the territory.

Four teams turned up with between 8 and 13 players each while one team, in the true spirit of good-natured, social, “old mans rugby”, managed to scrape up 20 players (including some well under the required age limit), a physio, a manager and even a roll of medical tape. Clearly, winning this social tournament was a high priority for that Club.

Standing around with blank stares, most teams were at a loss as to how they should prepare for a 12-minute match of ten-a-side rugby. A couple of Nags casually leaned against the goal post in an heartless attempt to look vaguely interested whilst perhaps engineering a tournament abandonment by toppling key apparatus of the playing field. Another few puffed heartily on ciggies and vape pipes while another lamented the thoughtless consumption of four beers leading up to the event.

The tourney kicked off on schedule at 7.30pm with Nags taking on the men from Kowloon as a haze of booze fumes hung heavily over the Loon second row in a night for regrettable long lunches. Both teams fumbled with the complexities and subtleties of playing with five less players and the subsequent additional space that had to be covered but eventually, after a fiercely fought 12 minutes, Valley eked out a 5-0 win, secured with a try from Andre.

In the second match, a nine-man Valley managed another W against Sandy Bay in an exhausting 12 minutes. By now Boozer had the hooter operator in his pocket, managing to get this match, and the next, hooted a few minutes early, to the cheers of both teams.

Worth mentioning at this point that Valley only had nine players thanks to the inclusion of Cloughy and Rigger from Tigers (who couldn’t get a team together). Somehow, the numbers had mysteriously and miserably dwindled from 30+ in the XV-a-side final, to 7 just a few weeks later – from a WhatsApp group of 65 able-bodied but ultimately self-centred, selfish bastards preferring to remain able-bodied throughout the weekend and following 14 days.

Loud boos rung around the stadium, during the HKFC vs Police match as two club players were ejected from the pitch, alarmingly but rewardingly, by a referee who is a member of the same club. A yellow card for chirping the ref with some unnecessary lip and a red card for a gutless punch aimed at a rozzer, confirmed that this team had somewhat misunderstood the intended spirit of a Friday night social league.

T Scott was later roped in from the Bay to boost numbers to ten. The spritely 50 year old Ocker joined the other four Valley players in their 50’s for an average age of around 47. The combined sponsorship-worthy dosage of Panadol and Voltarin on Saturday morning, alongside a full English is a delightful Saturday morning ritual to be cherished.

Valley’s third match was against the old Bill who’d begun to run out of steam slightly earlier than the Nags. Highlights of this match, played in good spirits, as God and Cloughy intended, include Rigger scoring his first ever try at the age of 45. The Birmingham bomber had only taken up rugby four years earlier and better yet, he went on to score a second in the same match. Brooksy also features for scoring one try and then executing possibly the worst ever conversion attempt that rolled sideways about four metres. To avoid further goal kicking humiliation, he then utterly avoided a second try by passing it on to Cloughy for a meat pie. Great stuff!

The final match of the night, at 9.30pm, featured the two unbeaten teams – Valley Nags vs HKFC. It was good versus evil, the very old versus the not very old, two bitter rivals and neighbours. Ahead of the match there was a minute's silence as all five teams lined up on the pitch, in remembrance of Sean Browne.

A minutes silence for HK rugby legend Sean Browne

Dear Reader, I wish I had good news for you but, quite frankly, the Nags were absolutely munted in this match. Very briefly, from the kick off, Boozer got the Nags about three metres into the opponents half and from there on it was all misery, dropped balls and tries conceded.

You’ve gotta magnanimously and humbly take your hat off to the Footy club fellas; sure, they had enough players for two teams and had a manager who insisted on the squad warming up, stretching and running through game plans. And sure, they had a few blokes in their 30’s and none in their 50’s and sure, they’d had a bloke red-carded for punching a copper but that’s not their fault.

Standing around with blank stares while one team vigorously warms up

Nor was it their fault that their try-scoring 35-year old had to viciously and gutlessly belt a Police player in the back of the head with his forearm in the dead ball area as he was departing the pitch with his team from the previous match. To his credit, he didn’t seem to mind being called a “complete tosser” but that’s just brash adolescent swag isn’t it?

Aside from all that, the Nags had absolutely no complaints about being absolutely bloody hopeless in that final match. It was an inglorious shambles for the entire 12 minutes punctuated with a suspect red card to Brooksy, who’d tipped his opposite number towards the turf, head first, but did manage to pull out at the last minute – thanks to Olse. While he feigned disappointment and regret, he was quickly and gleefully sipping a cool beverage on the side-line within less than 30 seconds.

Sadly, very sadly, for Club, there was no trophy, meaning that the Nags are still the only rugby team in Hong Kong to receive silverware in the 2020/21 season - something that Colin Olsen will treasure until the end of days.

A familiar post-match ensued with first beers being opened at about 10pm, some tunes, tall stories in the dark and then a mad dash in an Uber to Tung Chung at 1am, a lost phone and waking up in a child's bunk bed. Standard!

Once again – a hearty measure of gratitude to Cloughy, Rigger and Scotty for bolstering our numbers and giving a hundy for Valley and of course to Cloughy for his organisation of the league and this tournament.

Have a great summer everybody!

Match details

Match date

Fri 25 Jun 2021

Kickoff

19:30
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