"WE'VE crossed the bridge," belted out the Blackrock College hordes yesterday from underneath the rafters of their home away from home Donnybrook.
The Leinster Senior Cup kicked into overdrive with this first quarter final yesterday, and, in a repeat of last year's final, Blackrock refused to succumb to Newbridge.
Not that this was a totally convincing performance. In fact, Newbridge got the odd fortuitous rub of the green to generate a third quarter onslaught that ruffled Blackrock's thoughts of further feathering their nest of 62 titles.
In this period, the ball was bouncing kindly for Newbridge. It didn't hurt that they were capable of taking Blackrock to task in the maul. The shorter, stockier Kildare boys' body positions were taxing the holders' organisational skills and forcing penalties. Perhaps, fortune was favouring their bravery. Either way, one felt that when Newbridge failed to turn this ascendancy into profit on the scoreboard, they were going to get burned.
Anyway, Blackrock must have been relieved to keep their 12-5 interval lead intact. Having weathered the storm, this is too good a side not to punish Newbridge for their penetrative shortcomings.
After 56 minutes, in a sweeping movement over 65 metres, Brian O'Driscoll's initial agility in picking Scott Garrett's miscued kick up off his bootlaces was complemented by full back Michael Price's strong burst over the halfway line. Andrew Browne, Brian O'Driscoll, prop Niall Treston and scrum half Ciaran Scally all handled before second row Daire Keating burrowed his way over for the best try of the match. This was the type of gut wrenching score that knocks the wind out of sides.
Buoyed by this, Blackrock came again. This time, Newbridge's inventive out half Brent Ward was powerless to prevent O'Driscoll benefiting from his half back partner Scally's drive and number eight David Lavin's expert pass. O'Driscoll kicked the conversion himself.
The inclement conditions were not helped by a schizophrenic wind that blew one way, then the other. Two Leslie Copeland penalties went by the wayside in the 9th and 10th minutes.
With Newbridge pressing constantly early on, they were always prone to the sucker punch. And international school by scrum half Scally delivered the body blow from close in on 15 minutes. His international colleague Dara Kavanagh made the conversion, but failed to add to his own try ten minutes later.
Copeland made up for his penalty misses with a tremendous piece of footballing intuition just before the break when winning the race to his own kick ahead. What Newbridge missed thereafter was another flash of this footballing nous, something a little different or unexpected, to unlock a disciplined Blackrock wall.
