Bradford & Bingley Tour Match, Saturday 25th April 2009

About Bradford

A city rich in culture, architecture and attractions, Bradford has lots to offer. Choose from popular attractions such as the National Media Museum, the magnificent Alhambra Theatre or sample some of the best in Asian cuisine.

Nearby UNESCO World Heritage Site, Saltaire, is a perfect example of a Victorian village. Today Salts Mill is home to one of the largest collections of David Hockney's work.

Ilkley is also known for its good shopping and eating out, as well as having some of the most beautiful countryside in Yorkshire. White Wells and the Manor House, two of Ilkley's historical attractions, illustrate Ilkley's long and fascinating history.

History is also to be found in Haworth, the home of the Brontës. The Brontë Parsonage Museum is a wonderful place to learn more about this famous family. Steam trains, stately homes and transport museums are just some of Brontë Country must-sees. 

The Real Lions tour

Forget the upcoming Lions’ tour to South Africa, the Lions Vets’ tour to Bradford was the only gig in town.  As ever, military precision had gone into the planning and preparation and a hand picked squad of 23 took on the daunting task of taming the Northern outfit. The rendezvous point was again MacDonalds at Fosse Park. Blazers and ties were not stipulated so a mix of attire was sported, Hawaiian shirts were donned by Slim and James Earnshaw, the garish shade of green on James’ shirt still not able to match the green of his face after a heavy session the day before. The predominant item of dress was the ill fated tee shirts - I finally received mine as we were about to leave. It felt a bit like when you were a child at Christmas, having all the expectation of getting a Scalextric, only to receive a matchbox car and a bit of plastic yellow track, perfectly functional yet aesthetically all wrong.
 For the third year running nearly everyone mistakenly bought the MacDonald’s breakfast and commented on the vile coffee they serve, only to then collect the tokens and get more of the stuff. Cars then loaded we took to the road. Big Cookie and Andy were entertained to a CD of Buster’s son’s band, the awkward silence and tumble weed passing through the car apparently spoke volumes. Following Nango’s meticulous directions, we all arrived at the Premier Inn Cleckheaton (with the Premier inn’s claim that if you don’t get a good nights sleep, you get your money back this could well have been a loss making exercise for them) negotiations followed about who was to share with whom, and various claims of ‘I only snore when I’ve had a drink’, (the irony of the impending game of rugby and post match session completely lost on them).
 Nango had arranged a mini bus to take us to the game with a couple of cars to follow, the ground being about 8 miles away. Togga confidently put the address in his sat nav only for the left turn out the car park to throw it off scent and big Matt ran the gauntlet of the Bradford speed cameras in an effort to keep up with the bus.  We arrived at the ground in good time though, and were able to watch a bit of cricket on the adjacent pitch with only mild barracking from the side lines.

The Match

Things looked ominous when we could only see one pitch and barely all of that because it was so big. Bradford & Bingley seem to have players turning up from everywhere and an awful lot of youth to boot. It then dawned on us that our only judge of the relative merits of the B&B side had been Dan. Who for one has not always/never been known for his fine judgment of a rugby match and for two, was at this point in time over the other side of the world in Thailand (who knows what he was up to). Nango, undaunted, rallied his troops and off we all trotted to get changed. Once changed and out on the never ending pitch, Stotty (finally making his seasonal debut due to his arthritic hips) felt we needed a warm up. Obviously the 20 odd degrees and blazing sunshine weren’t enough. Regular readers of these match reports will be aware of Stotty’s last attempt at a warm up which ended when casualty numbers were recorded at only slightly less than the Battle of the Somme. Fortunately, common sense took over and gentle stretching and a bonding team talk was all that was required.  Nango’s previously mentioned meticulous planning had let him down as he had lost the team sheet; after a frantic search and much head scratching it turned up and 15 reasonably able bodies took the field.

B&B kicked off and immediately exerted the pressure in the Lions’ 22, but a penalty for not releasing gave us our first bit of possession, and relief followed after a good kick for ground by Ady Giles (filling the fly half berth as Matt Gardner had decided to play cricket instead). Colonel fielded a kick back with a purposeful run, we recycled well and were able to find the Colonel again, who seemed to enjoy the space the pitch afforded him.  Feeling slightly more confident now we became more expansive -  we again recycled good ball on our 10 metre line. We decided to run, only to find Matt Cunningham in the wrong place -  B&B seized on his knock on and a break down the wing with the inevitable missed tackle enabled them to scamper away for the first score, conversion followed - 7-0.  Tails up, B&B start exerting more pressure with some clever offloading out ofthe tackle  - another break away and only a loose pass fielded to safety by Togga prevented a second try. Pressure eventually did tell and the 2nd try came after they found one of their younger quick lads and he was able to outstrip the flailing attempts at tackles, conversion missed - 12-0. Two further tries came shortly after with B&B showing good handling skills and greater pace - 26-0.
Lions, desperately in need of some inspiration and possession found their feet. After a scrum on half way, Togga broke blind, threw a couple of dummies and a side step, then fed Wilba on the scissors who got into the B&B 22, quick recycled ball found Walshie standing in the stand off position much to his and everyone else’s surprise shouted at to go straight (we didn’t want to risk him passing, not that there was much chance of that anyway). We again recycled well and had a 5-2 overlap. Ady fed Togga who drew his man and found Stew Watson, who probably could have crashed over but he in turn fed Colonel who definitely should have scored, he then fed Dave Allison who finally put us out our misery to score in the left hand corner. Colonel was later accused of bottling the chance to catch up with Vanny in the scoring charts, to which he failed to offer up much defence - 26-5.
 Buoyed by this success and with our collective peckers up we strung together some nice moves. A dummy between Stu and Togga putting Colonel away and he was just held up short of the line.  Nigel Prothero was making a nuisance of himself and breaking tackles for fun. Our second score came when Nango collected the ball on the ten metre line - he found Colonel, who fed wide to Togga and a bit of interplay between him and Nige in the 22 eventually saw Nige cross for the try. Conversion missed narrowly by Ady, who suffered some barracking for the time it took him to take the kick. Although welcomed by all of the Lions’ players as a chance to get their breath back, his later claims that this was a deliberate tactic were roundly shot down in flames. 26-10. With half time beckoning another score would have really put us back in it sadly it was B&B that who got the try after winning clean line out ball -  pace and space did for us, half time 31-10.

POST MATCH

Sadly, no post match Yorkshire tea to report or tea of any kind for that matter. With the sun still blazing away we were all able to sit outside and soak up the rays and carry out the match post mortem, whilst pondering the bigger question, where to go that night, with the whole of West Yorkshire at our mercy.  The answer to this seemed to be nowhere really, so everyone got settled soaking up the ale and rays. Nango sat himself down at a table in the clubhouse counting and piling up wads of money like some latter day Dickens’ character before handing it out to the grateful urchins wanting beer money.
We now come to the regular seasonal faux pas. B&B kindly made a presentational speech and presented the Captain a club tie; we of course had nothing to give. ( For those present last year we received a shirt and ball from Robertsbridge RFC and all we had in return was a Dan Quelsh made Heath Robinson style plaque that would have had Tony Hart turning in his grave had he seen it. This was left lying about in a puddle of beer and such were the materials used to create it, it soaked up all the said beer. We still had the bare faced cheek to present this trophy and it now proudly sits in a landfill somewhere in Sussex. So in return we offered B&B the latest Dan creation, the infamous t-shirt, wisely turned down they settled for beer.
By 9pm still at a very full clubhouse, we decided to finally venture to the local haunts, a convoy of taxis latter we all arrived to sample the delights of Bingley. Let off the leash most of us just found a corner and carried on drinking and pontificating about the world. The exceptions were our single chaps Nige Prothero and Little Cookie who, confidence brimming after a few beers felt they could tame the local ladies, and set their sights on a couple of attractive leggy blondes, the general consensus being they were punching well above their weight, how they got on we will come on to later. A few more adventurous souls ventured further into Bingley and other hostelries; apparently Slim was heard performing his own version of Karaoke in the town. Nige and Little Cookie now sat down tête-à-tête seemed to be progressing nicely. Thoughts among the rest of us turned to curry and being in one of the best places in the country for curry, expectations were high.( Given the last 2 years we have ended up in probably the worst curry house in the South East things could only improve). Consulting the locals, we found out there are no Curry Houses in Bingley but the largest Curry House in the world the Aakash was only up the road in Cleckheaton. This was much disputed  by Andy Winsland,  who was convinced it was somewhere in Manchester.  Largest Curry House or not it closed at 11pm so was no good to us. So to the Akbar in Bradford - 10 of us started out but Big Matt and Dave Allison inexplicably favoured the burger over the curry. Bob Dylan’s dulcet tones playing over the radio on the way, Winsland now in full contrary mood, dismissed the man as a charlatan with no talent. So, sat down with food in front of us, the debate turned once again to Dylan; whilst agreeing he is a somewhat misanthropic man (miserable git) he clearly has some talent for the written word. We turned to Big Cookie, a man to be trusted for a sage opinion, but he was deep in meditative thought with his eyes closed. When questioned on his own musical tastes Winsland admitted to a fondness for American warbler Maria Carey and the hirsute Scottish lady from Britain’s got talent. We shall leave this debate to quote Dylan himself “Come mothers and fathers, throughout the land, and don’t criticize what you don’t understand”.
Enough of that nonsense it was widely agreed by all who partook to be a very fine Indian indeed, except Big Cookie who was still meditating at this point. Clubbing in Bradford narrowly voted down as a bad idea it was back to the hotel, big taxi booked and Big Matt still following in his car, the driver missed the turning for the hotel Big Matt just kept following, Nango now much annoyed fearing an injustice and feeling we were about to be ripped off, harrumphed a lot. Turning to big Cookie for some perspective on the situation he was found to be meditating again. When we did finally get back and were charged a very reasonable rate his mood brightened and he even left a tip.
As we entered the hotel who should we see but Nige and Little Cookie tails between their legs devoid of leggy blondes long since departed to their respective boyfriends as suspected punching far too much above their weight.
At breakfast the next morning, we had a full turn out to dissect the previous night’s events, full English all round, Slim and James taking advantage of the ‘all you can eat’ option. Winsland and Big Cookie however, appeared invisible to the staff as they were passed over time and again as breakfasts arrived even though they were the first to order. Fearing another rant, a timely word was passed to the waitress. Although a big appetite for breakfast there was little appetite for doing anything else other than making our way home. The mention of places to visit such as Saltaire drawing very blank looks. We shall leave the culture for another day.
So with a big thanks to Nango for another successful tour & season completed we made our way home to graze over the summer months, and await the Vets’ summer night out. 

    www.aakashrestaurant.co.uk/ ( apparently the largest in the world)