28 January 2009

Rotten January

My fourth cancellation of the month - waterlogged pitch today at King's School Winchester. Others were at University of Portsmouth, Alton Women, and at Winchester for the Hampshire U14 Trials. And Petersfield's 1st XV match versus Ellingham (I was there for the Vice Presidents' lunch) was postponed for a week due to the frozen pitch.

This has been just about the worst month since I started refereeing for Hampshire RU Referees' Society, after gaining my National Foundation Certificate on 24th January 1999. Hopefully, February will be better.

25 January 2009

Petersfield Colts reach cup last 16 in a great if muddy performance

Petersfield 29, Saracens Amateurs 0. A well-contested game of Rugby, but Petersfield scrambled better in the Penn's Place mud to score three tries before half time, adding two more in the second period. Great joy.

23 January 2009

Matt Stevens

What a sad story - at 26, he's admitted using a 'serious recreational drug' and is likely to be out of Rugby for the next two years. This will wreck or at least seriously delay his career. He's a big man - big enough to apologise to all of the people who've helped him up to now, to take counselling, and to own up rather than trying to pretend the allegations were false.

He could really help others to avoid his fate by naming and shaming the people that got him on this slippery slope. But that's unlikely to happen.