Live rugby!!!

For a change of scene, I went to a live match as I'd reached a point where I desperately needed to see some live sport. And so I found myself at the Leicester Tigers v London Wasps game at the Tigers home ground. The ground itself is very tight (few metres from stand to pitch), so it's quite intimate. There's a new stand, which is nice, but the others remind me of smaller stadiums in NZ, I would guess 20,000 capacity? But the ground was full, and apparently that's common for the Tigers. So no complaints there. Audience was into it, although slightly weird from what I was used to. Total (and I mean total) silence during kicks, even the opposition. And very polite.

So the game, first half was good. Leicester were lucky in the first quarter to get an intercept try, the ball was thrown around a bit, and good retention at ruck and maul time. The first-five's traded penalties, and the one further try meant the Tigers went to the break with a reasonably deserved lead.
Second half was dire. Poor retention, and no imagination by either team. The backline moves were telegraphed, and simply involved shovelling it along and running sideways, so the sliding defence by both sides quashed all attacks. There was a desperate need for someone to run the angles, and someone needs to smack the northern hemisphere around the head for the continuing use of badly done 'chip' kicks. I don't think any came off today, so they simply gave the ball away. Kicks within play were poor by both teams.

I enjoyed the first half, but got increasingly frustrated in the second. This struck me as funny given we had (from NZ and/or Samoa) the following players:
Tigers Scott Hamilton; the many Tuilagi's; Thomas Waldrom; Craig Newby
Wasps Riki Flutey;
there may have been a couple of others, oh and Steve Kefu (from Aussie).

Felt like a bad Div1 (NZ) or reasonable Div2 game. This wasn't helped by the colours, Wasps wear Wellington (although hoops), and Tigers wear something similar to Manawatu

Love, your roving rugger reporter.