U14s long weekend in Bucharest

U14s Very Long Weekend in Bucharest

Friday
Who said it is better to travel in anticipation than to arrive? What a load of b@llocks!

The intrepid trailblazers of the U14 squad met in Heathrow at 4pm with new tour shirts, new kits bags, loads of balls and passports in hand. No, wait a sec, that’s not strictly true. 94% of party arrived as described, the other 6% opted to leave their passport at home. It’d be cruel to name names, but Rowan you are a very fined muppet.

Check in was delayed by about an hour as missing passport was retrieved. Some of the party thought they needed 2 bags for the journey, one for the boxers and one for the toothbrush perhaps? The flight passed with little incident; the stewardesses were mightily impressed with the tightest of the tight fit shirts.

The accommodation had been described as making Brean Sands Pontins look like a holiday camp. This couldn’t have been further from the truth. The Students Sports Centre in the Tei area of Budapest is a purpose built sports complex with a rugby pitch, football pitches, basket ball courts and loads of tennis courts (scene of some very interesting matches indeed). Oh, and there were a few bars too. The beds were comfy, the weather warm and the breakfast palatable, served beautifully on at least 2 occasions. What more could a touring side want? Answer – some mozzie repellent – the nearby lake meant the local residents feasted on fresh English beef all weekend, making some of the squad look quite spotty.

Saturday
Started quite leisurely, wending our way to breakfast at 9am.

Our first game was against Pantelimon Rugby Club at the Olimpia Stadium the other side of the city. Kick-off was scheduled for midday, when the temperature approached 30oC. We did not know that Pantelimon had not been beaten this season: we didn’t know what to expect. For starters, in Romania, U14s play 12 a side between the 22m lines.

For the first few minutes things looked evenly balanced but Maids started to apply pressure though some good driving in the forwards, running the backs and strong scrimmaging. Our first try came for a well controlled scrum and blind side break by Ben, showing just why we missed him so much this season. The second try came quite quickly from a stolen lineout and another blindside snipe by Ben. This was looking good – for about 15 seconds. A knock on from the restart gifted the ball to the Pantelimon centre (a Lomu lookalike in size and haircut) who sped through unopposed to score for the hosts. However we regained our composure did the simple stuff well and again set ourselves up with a good attacking scrum. And Ben delivered again with a dummy step and acceleration for his hat-trick. However, Pantelimon were not giving up and when Maidenhead allowed their scrum half to run across the whole width of the pitch and then dart over to score, it was really game on. 15-10 to Maids at half time.

Perhaps we should just look at the touring party and how they lined up. The Romanian game is for 5 forwards and 7 backs. We had a party of 8 forwards and 5 backs. We had a hooker and a flanker in the centres, a scrum half on the wing and a number 8 at prop (I have to say Warrick looked made for it!), and a spare front row player as sub who played on the wing for some of the games!

The second half also started well for Maids, applying pressure at the restart and forcing the Pantelimon boys back to their line. We couldn’t secure the ball, but as it was passed along the line Ben demolished the centre who spilled the ball for Jamie T to pick up and score. Awesome offensive tackling! However, Ben took a knock to the shoulder and came off, Rowan to moving to wing allowing Jono to stand in at scrum half. And his first action was to take a blindside break draw 2 players and offload to Patrick who strolled over in the corner. The final try of the game was an absolute peach. Maids were running hard and offloading well in the tackle knowing there would be support players coming from depth. We got to within 10m of the line before being forced into touch. But another stolen lineout (Oli and Soapy had been jumping well all day, aided by Phil’s excellent throwing) allowed us to feed the backline. Chris attacked the space between 10 and 12, Will between 12 and 13 and a beautifully timed and weighted pass allowed Jamie T in for his 2^nd. Game over, 30-10 to Maids. Pantelimon were distraught but, from this correspondent’s one eyed view of the game, comprehensively out thought and out played by the tourists.

A special mention must go to the referee who was absolutely brilliant – probably the best we have had anywhere – communicated well and played advantage well. Then we found out that he had been reffing the national side the previous week and the Romanian equivalent of the GP final the week before that we could see why. We had the Romanian equivalent of Spreaders in charge and would like him to come and ref our Berks league games!

Pizzas and refreshing malty beverage were consumed at the Olimpias clubhouse (for tour organisers of the future: 17 top quality 12" pizzas +4 litres of refreshing malty beverage for £36!) before heading off to watch the GP final on to dinner and so to bed.

Sunday
A cultural day – a trip to Transylvania, land of mountains, forests and castles and once upon a time home of the Prince of Darkness, Lord of the Undead, and role model for the insects of the lake at the hotel: Count Dracula. Firstly we visited the royal palace at Peles, built by King Carol I, the first king of Romania, in C19^th . It was pretty spectacular and boasted mod cons like electricity, running water, electric lifts and a central vacuum cleaning system. Next it was on to lunch – typical Romanian fare and a restaurant in the forest, noodle soup, baked gammon, cabbage rolls, sauerkraut and mamaliga – a sort of polenta porridge and quite missable –followed by doughnuts with apple jam and sour cream (‘Ugh this cream’s gone off’, ‘Doh, its meant to be like that stupid!’). Finally onto the home of Vlad Tepes, or Vlad the Impaler (allegedly the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula): Bran Castle. Vlad Tepes was not a nice man by all accounts, but he kept the Turks at bay in the C16^th and is a National Hero in Romania. Bran Castle looks like it ought to, all Gothic turrets tiled roofs and courtyards. The boys were desperate to spend their Lei in the market in its shadow on Dracula memorabilia and high quality stuff (sorry about that Mums and Dads). Then back to Bucharest for some more Romanian food in a very hot (and slow) restaurant downtown.

Monday
Our last rugby day of the tour, and we weren’t quite sure what was going on. We knew we were playing in the evening, but weren’t sure against whom or at what time. Nonetheless we had a run out in the morning to try and practice some of our moves – and it was obvious that tour fatigue was setting in. Later we had a trip into Revolution Square, to see where Ceaucescu was deposed (and 1300 citizens machine gunned down by the army) before retiring to a shady bar for some lunch of traditional Romanian pastries. This was very relaxing and led to 2 of party nodding off in the hammocks provided. But still they wanted to go shopping – thank goodness we’d run out of time and had to get back to the hotel for our game.

We got to play Pantelimon again, thinking the kick off was at 5pm then 6pm we actually got going at 5:30 before the official ref arrived, so the Pantelimon coach stood in. It was clear that the Pantelimon boys had done their homework and learned from Saturday’s game. It was clear that the Maids were suffering a bit from tour fatigue, and it was blindingly obvious that the locals were getting the rub of the green.

Pantelimon started at a great pace and it wasn’t long before we showed our old tendencies of falling off the tackles in the centres to concede the first try. Pantelimon gathered the restart and kicked for position – something they had hardly done at all on Saturday. Their scrum half made a dart down the blindside from a scrum, a trick he must also have learnt from Ben on Saturday, to score their second. But now Maids started to fire, getting wound up by some strange refereeing decisions. A mis-placed kick from Pantelimon fell to Jamie M, who made good ground before hoisting the ball himself. He chased strongly and beat the whole Pantelimon team to make the touch down and register Maids first points of the match – a superb bit of individual skill and tenacity. Maids gathered the restart and were making good headway again, but a shuddering tackle left Dominic with a nasty twisted ankle, ending his contribution to the effort. Pantelimon were awarded the scrum and again worked the ball well through their backs to score again in spite of at least two howling forward passes. Maids tempers were fraying and looked like we were about to lose the plot when half time was blown with score at 5-15. Time to get the boys’ heads back together: at least now we had the official referee.

But the restart was a disaster, we missed the catch, fumbled backwards and ended up touching down over the line. Pantelimon attacked from the 5m scrum and scored a simple try. Maids responded with some flowing rugby, again supporting from depth, offloading in the tackle. A fine back line attack sent Jono over in the corner. Again we messed up the restart, passed to no-one, made no effort to retrieve the ball and let Pantelimon in again. The tour and the heat was taking its toll. There was about 2 minutes remaining, and Maids were beaten but still playing to salvage some pride. Again a sweeping backline move drew in the cover defence and put Jono clear for his second of the day. The final whistle blew and Pantelimon savoured a 25-15 win, their pride restored. Maids were however unbowed having won 45-35 on aggregate.

There were some presentations after the game – we donated 10 training balls and 2 ball bags and in return were given Pantelimon medals and FRR badges. We had a post match meal where the boys mixed on the tables and seemed to get on really well. New friendships were forged. Ben said a few words of thanks on behalf of MRFC, and one of the Romanian players gave us a speech in English before returning home. The boys then had an end of tour party, con brio and no small amount of mess.

Tuesday
A tough morning of clearing up and packing before a trip to Ceaucescu’s monstrous Casa Poporului – the People’s Palace. The tour had taken its toll, and there were a few casualties on the last morning – the party resembled a line of stragglers from WW1 more than a rugby squad. At the People’s Palace we were treated to some good, old-style Eastern Bloc customer service waiting for the guide. Pretty it ain’t, impressive in a ghoulish kind of way it most certainly is. Why would you need a 5 tonne chandelier or a 40 tonne carpet? To think that 1/6^th of Bucharest was demolished to build it, 300,000 people uprooted and the country bankrupted in the process is quite humbling.

From the Palace to the airport and some lunch before making our way to the plane. Obviously we were the last ones to board and had to get escorted through the VIP/diplomatic channel to stop the bags being taken off, but we all made it safely home, exhausted but with memories that will last a lifetime.

The squad were a delight to be with, and were fantastic ambassadors for themselves, their parents, the club and the country, so now we need to plan next year’s adventure: Barcelona? Sweden? Italy? or somewhere more exotic?