Bad day at the office

After three bonus point wins on the bounce Harlequins made the journey up to Hendon to try and continue the run. The day didn’t start well, with Aaron Addis getting stuck in Central London and not being able to make the game Si Rowland stepped from blindside flanker to left wing.

Hendon had only lost one match the same as Quins but nearly all of their matches were low scoring affairs, and so Quins knew they would be up against a tight game.

Hendon also had a home pitch that gives all the advantages to the side that knows it. Dave Love lost the toss and so Harlequins started the match playing up hill, into wind and being blinded by the sun, the trifecta.

The game started auspiciously, after winning their own kick Harlequins decided to run into touch giving Hendon a lineout around their own 10m line. Hendon won the lineout and kicked down the line to an anticipating Dave Love, who despite being told to keep it tight, tried to pass it 15m left by spinning it off his right hand, in a bizarre looking motion. The pass was forward and knocked on, little did Quins know but this was to sum up their day.

As expected Hendon played a tight game, choosing to rumble it up with their big forwards to make ground rather than using their backs. Quins defence around the breakdown which has been very effective this season nullifying all other backs, strangely went missing, and Hendon used this to their advantage breaking lost of tackles as Quins consistently went too high on the big runners.

Another source of woe so far this season for Quins is the high penalty county, this match was no different with Quins penalised the Hendon kicker stepped up and assuredly slotted the 3 points. 3-0.

Playing a little better; Quins forced their way into Hendon’s 22 and were soon rewarded with penalty chance of their own, the skipper opted for the posts and the ever reliable George Jaques obliged to level the scores at 3-3.

The match for the most part was a turgid affair, very little running rugby was offered by either team, both opting to kick for territory. Twice more Quins were adjudged to have infringed and twice more the Hendon kicker slotted his attempt to lead at half time, 9-3.

Playing the second half downhill, though the wind seemed to drop and the sun went behind a cloud, Quins hoped their fortunes would change and it seemed it might as early into the second half Mike Lovelock crashed over from short range to score the first try of the match, George Jaques put the conversion over as Harlequins took the lead, 9-10.

The lead was short lived however as once again Quins were penalised and Hendon took the points and the momentum in the match, 12-10.

Harlequins just didn’t have the cutting edge that they have shown in other matches, failing to get over the break tackles and make any inroads into the Hendon defence. George Jaques was desperately unlucky as after spotting the full back out of position kicked behind the defence chasing his own kick with flanker/ winger Si Rowland the ball bounced dead, a bounce in the other direction would have seen a certain try.

With heads going down tackles became worse and worse and a good off loading game sawn Hendon score in the corner, the conversion that seemed wide to most was given, which would prove costly to Quins, as the game finished 19-10. A second loss of the season for Harlequins but the first time they haven’t recorded a bonus point this season.

MoM – Mitchell Collins
DoD – Paul Hibbert*

*originally given to Dave Love for aforementioned pass in the first minute, but as he ran away quickly after the match it was given to Paul to celebrate his birthday.