Match Report for Doha I v Abu Dhabi Harlequins 02 October 2009
By Peter Townson
Doha: Under the floodlights of the Doha Rugby Football Centre (DRFC), the Abu Dhabi Harlequins produced a consummate performance to outplay the home side, beating them 29-8 and breaking their unbeaten run of last season.
Abu Dhabi started the match well, racking up a penalty before scoring the opening try of the match after breaking through a lazy Doha’s defensive line, adding the conversion to take the score to 10-0.
Despite Abu Dhabi piling on the pressure, Doha were doing their best to put together meaningful backline moves, to no avail. Doha missed a penalty chance before putting their first points on the board to make the score 10-3.
This was how the scoreboard remained until the half time whistle, and Doha were lucky to go into the break without conceding more points.
Doha seemed to emerge for the second half with a little more intent, however they could do nothing to stop the Abu Dhabi Harlequins backline dominating throughout.
Any breaks the Doha forwards were making left them isolated, and they were not able to provide any quick ball for their backs to put together attacking moves. Shifting the ball from one side of the field to the other, Abu Dhabi were able to find gaps in the home side’s defence which led to another try which was then converted. This took the score to 17-3 and Abu Dhabi were looking good for their lead.
Abu Dhabi added another converted try in controversial circumstances as it seemed that Doha’s defender had grounded the ball before the Abu Dhabi attacker. However, it was no more than Abu Dhabi deserved as they continued to apply pressure to Doha’s defence.
Anton Cramant drove over to score one try for Doha towards the end of the match, but Abu Dhabi added another try to take the final score to 29-8 and secure a bonus point.
Doha captain Richard Liddington, who was one of the club’s outstanding performers last season, was noticeably disappointed with the team’s efforts, and placed the blame upon the team’s attitude as well as the performance levels of the front five.
“Last season we built our success on the performance of the front five, but today we were sub-par, myself included,” he conceded. “Abu Dhabi are a very good team, but I truly believe we can beat anyone in this league,” he said, adding “today we were simply not good enough.”
Liddington added that the fitness levels of the team were another contributing factor to their disappointing display.
“We need to improve on our fitness – we have not had a good off season preparation and we need to work on our match sharpness.”
“However, the main thing is the attitude – we are the best team in the Gulf but we need to start playing with the belief that we are,” he added.
DRFC club captain, Dave Kane shared similar feelings of disappointment, but thanked the large home crowd for their support and said that with a bit more confidence, the team would be okay in the future.
“We need a bit more self belief,” he said, “Today was a very quiet performance with not a lot of fire on show from the boys – we need to start playing with confidence throughout the whole match.”