The second half at the Stoop descended into comedy last Friday as the Harlequins wonderkid, Marcus Smith, swaggered off the bench to insert yet more misery into the Bears’ fragile psyche. By fronting a forty-five point hostile take-over of their half time lead he administered what can only be described as a corporate shellacking and if Bristol had been a public listed company, they would have been liquidated before the game was up.
It was sobering viewing for both the visiting fans, and those melting down on their west country sofas, as despite spending the majority of the first half wildly celebrating the return of the high tempo, clinical and try-rich rugby to which they had become addicted they eventually saw their dreams empty as fast as a sweetie jar on Halloween.
Where in the first half the pack had provided a solid platform, the half backs had pulled the strings and the back line had delivered the yards, in the second their collective confidence ebbed away like a low tide at Weston. Sure, there were key moments that went Quins’ way and sure, the Bears continued to try and play the only way they know how, but whichever way you look at it, the fact remains that Bristol’s knockout nemesis came back to bite them even harder than before and with over half a century of points on the scoreboard it began to feel like the painful, dark days of ‘Worcester away’.
It’s hard to understand why things went so badly wrong so quickly. Clearly the Heenan yellow was a turning point and whatever you feel about the way that refs appear to go for the card before even taking a moment to try and unravel the complex dynamics of sixteen hefty men all grabbing onto each other for dear life in a maul, that doesn’t mean that shipping points at a regular clip straight after is a certainty.
No, it appeared to me that with fourteen men the system was less the solution and more the problem as the Bears surrendered any sort of control by getting isolated and turned over at will. If ever there was a time for someone to suggest taking the heat out of the situation by keeping it tight or kicking it long and deep, then this was it. Sadly, it just didn’t seem like anyone had a Scooby what to Doo. That said, it’s easy to blame the players on the park for errors in judgement because as any soldier will tell you, in the heat of battle you go back to your training and if the training is to play one particular way, then perhaps you can start to make sense of what went on. If you do subscribe to the fact that the system was and always is the solution then ultimately the players were doing what they were told but simply weren’t good enough to execute it.
And therein lies the conundrum. Was the system wrong or were the players underperforming for those ten minutes within an essentially correct game plan? Either way there was a catastrophic dereliction of duty somewhere along the line and the price was heavily paid. We await the next team sheet to see for whom the bell might have tolled but as John Dunne also said, ‘no man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main’. In other words, you win as a team, and you lose as a team so maybe they’ll all get a chance to redeem themselves at the weekend.
So, regardless of why it all went wrong, how do fans process a result like this?
Well, first you have to look at the arc of history. As most primary school historians will tell you Rome wasn’t built in a day and establishing an empire is a complex and time-consuming task. Despite this early season blip we are still in a position that only the deluded, the mentally deficient or the imbiber of hallucinogenic drugs would have believed as little as ten years ago and we know we have a stability around the wider structures of the club that should see us good for the next ten at least. If you think of those dark days as the time when Romulus and Remus were hiding in the cave being suckled by the she-wolf, the rebranding as the Bears marked the point when the former killed the later and a new chapter in history was born. That said, even Romulus had his ups and downs but look what the Romans achieved over time despite what the People’s Front of Judea might have thought.
Secondly, and despite the horrors of the second half, we should take solace in the fact that for pretty much for the first time this term, we showed some of the magic that so inspired the fans last season. If the likes of Sam Bedlow can quickly move on, he will realise that he is making good progress and has much to offer. Piston Purdy was also a constant menace and in Fitz Harding we saw the emergence of a new star who brought a whole level of mobile filth to the proceedings despite the errant push that did little to help the cause when we rocking under the yellow card pump.
Finally, we must pay tribute to the opposition. Not only were the likes of Smith, Lynagh and Green just simply electric, but the way that Alex Dombrandt and Andre Esterhuizen delivered 80 minute all-court games and Joe Marler used the veneer of hubristic nonsense to mask the serious quality of the defence that he offers, makes you realise that we were soundly beaten by a team who I suspect never once believed that they were going to lose.
The reason we are so disappointed is because we were so inspired last year but as fans, we have to be realistic. No team has the right to rock up and win a game on reputation and no fan has the right to assume that every game will go they want it to. Both playing and supporting requires investment of time, energy and emotion and if times get tough then we all must dust ourselves off and go back into the heat of battle.
And what better battle for redemption awaits than Falcons away? Schooled by the Grizzler in Chief himself, what more could the Bears ask for than a chance to put things right when the chips seem so far down. Win up north this weekend, get some points from Irish and Warriors in early November after a reflective bye week and we could be strolling back up the mountain with a break for the Premiership Cup to come and an assault on Europe for which to prepare.
That’s the beauty of sport. You have to believe that you best game is still to come.
If you feel the need for some group therapy, then click here for Episode 84 of Bears Beyond The Gate, a podcast made by fans for fans.
Filthy Rig 