When Portsmouth Rocked and When the Music Stopped
Saturday should have been the eagerly awaited games against the RAF at Twickenham Stoop. The Women’s side have never had an enforced stoppage in an Inter Service Series, the men did when WWII broke out. We look at the matches played before the enforced stoppages and also in happier times the matches from 2008,’10 and 2014 when Portsmouth’s Burnaby Road rocked to Navy wins against Air Force opposition.
It was all so different in 1939, the last time a break in the Inter Services was forced upon the competition. The Royal Navy team that year prepared for the successful defence of their Inter Service crown with mobilisation happening all around them. A month after the Navy had beaten the RAF at Twickenham, Germany invaded Czechoslovakia, two of the side that played that day had already been mobilised to HMS Excellent to begin preparation for impending war. Some 80 years later the preparations for the 2019 RAF match had been all about building on the return to stadium fixtures, the new competitiveness of the Inter Services, could the Women close the gap on the Air Force and could a new men’s captain lead a comparatively young side to victory over the Inter Service champions. In those intervening 74 fixtures the Navy men had won 41 with 5 draws and only 28 wins for the RAF. However, during the 21st century, until the resurrection of the RAF fortunes from 2015 onwards, the Navy were totally dominant. But for a careless loss in 2005 the Navy could have enjoyed a 20-match unbeaten run. What they did manage though were two record scores at Burnaby Road where the Portsmouth faithful lifted the side to previously unseen attacking heights, whilst the Women’s XV produced a 3 match unbeaten run to level the series with the RAF at 6-6, in 2014, again in front of the Portsmouth crowd, in probably their best Inter Service performance to date. We will never know what twists of fortune 2020 may have had in store but we can look back at some memorable matches of the past.
If 2008 set the standards, 2010 surpassed them. High tempo rugby in April, both matches starting in glorious evening sun and finishing under the lights as Burnaby Road rocked to first a ten try bonanza in 2008, followed two years later by the even dozen. Records tumbled almost as quickly as the decibels rose. The 2008 match had seen the Navy change their pre match preparations. On the eve of the game they met with the Life Members of the Union, including 8 LMs who were former capped players. Wayne Duggan, an able rate and the only new cap, rubbed shoulders with Life Member elder statesman, Sir Ted Horlick, a former Vice Admiral. Their common bond, albeit separated by 70 years, was the pride in wearing the Navy Jersey. Duggan was to have a comparatively quite game the following evening, rarely tested in defence and providing intelligent link work as outside centre, Greg Barden, and right wing, Josh Drauniniu, ran amok scoring 8 tries between them. Will Pilkington on the flank and left wing Andy Vance scored the other 2 and with Dave Pascoe adding 7 conversions and a penalty as a record win, 67-12 was recorded. The Navy team had played with an ambition and tempo rarely seen before and certainly not in such a sustained manner that ensured the boisterous home crowd left Burnaby Road on a high having witnessed the Navy’s 48th victory over their rivals in blue. And from the stand Sir Ted looked down with pride.
The 2008 team could not complete the job as they succumbed to the Army a couple of weeks later but a couple of years later the side had developed and were to deliver the first Inter Service victory since 2001 along with a 50th win over the Royal Air Force. If the Twickenham finale was tense then the match at Burnaby Road was another, and better, exhibition of how joyous rugby football can be when played at pace with no little power and considerable skill. It surpassed all that was achieved in 2008. 8 different try scorers show what a complete team performance it was, and the catalyst was down to the two fly halves. Wayne John was too good a footballer not to be in the side and the captain, Dave Pascoe, had full control of his preferred No. 9 jersey. Rob Lloyd was one of the Navy’s most gifted ball players who could not fully make a team tick from fly half. With John at fly half and scrum half when needed and with Lloyd at fullback and flyhalf when needed the Navy had hit upon an attacking structure that suited the players they had. Rob Lloyd deservedly grabbed 3 of the tries himself but time and time again the John / Lloyd axis put strong runners like Les Dennis, Dale Sleeman, Calum MacRae and newly converted flanker, Greg Barden into half gaps and their power achieved the rest. A footnote to the 2010 match highlights the cruelty of sport. A key player in the style of play and a new cap that day was tighthead prop, Mark Owen. After 5 minutes of his debut he was forced off with a serious ankle injury and wasn’t to win his 2nd cap until 2014. Performances like the 2010 don’t just happen, they evolve in warm up matches and as importantly training sessions. On the 3G hockey pitch at HMS Temeraire Owen had brought a new dynamic in front row play to the Navy side, it remains a shame that the packed Burnaby Road crowd did not get to see him in a game which would have shown him at his best. He left the field at 0-0 but he contributed as much to the record 73-3 win as anyone.
Clearly the men’s play was infectious because as the men’s side slipped down a little from the highs of 2008 and 2010 so the Women’s XV picked up their game with a nail-biting 7-5 win over the RAF in 2012 followed by a hard fought away victory at RAF Halton in 2013. They arrived at a pristine Burnaby Road, looking to make it three in a row, and they achieved that in some style, a style based on ferocious defence and precision in attack, 3 strikes, 3 tries, job done. Emily Park and Stacey Hargrave celebrated their first caps by contributing to a front five performance that allowed Charlie Fredrickson to lead a backrow defencive effort which was simply first class. This was supported by newcomer scrumhalf, Ollie Critchley, whose diminutive size belies the ferocity and intensity of her play. Skipper Sarah Jenkins didn’t shirk her duties in the number 10 channel whilst outside her the Morton sisters continued their sibling rivalries of youth to see who could make the most dominant tackle, Francesca probably shaded this aspect of the game. The Navy had scored with their first real opportunity when winger Feisha Greene, crossed early on. For the next 35 minutes the Women defended their line with a discipline and tenacity they had not produced before and would have been content with a 5-0 half time lead. However, Loz Morton had other ideas and with rare possession sliced open the RAF defence and the race to the neat chip through was won by Sam Alderson. The second half saw the RAF start as they played most of the first half, on the front foot, but the Navy defence only gave them 2 penalties for their efforts. Then as the clock gradually counted down Jenks, at skipper came in to her own as her kicking game began to click and she started creating chaos in the RAF back three with a mix of high kicks and raking diagonals. At last a piece of quality possession was secured, tactics were changed, and she put Loz Morton once more into the half gap. This time Loz backed herself, broke the tackle and raced away to cross for the third try and wrap the match up for the Navy Women. Whilst the score did not reach the heights of the men a few years earlier it was, in its own way, an equal landmark for the women who had recovered to square the series with the Air Force 6-6.
And it is here that the effects of Covid19 really hit home. 6 years after that key game for the women a new side is evolving shaped by three former players who were all influential in the run of wins, Paula Bennett-Smith, is now Assistant Director, with Fredrickson and Morton both coaching. Critchley and Jenkins are both still in the side which has an exciting mix of experience and young, new players. As the 2020 season progressed the team was developing and IS2020 was going to be an interesting benchmark as to how far they had travelled when compared to the traditional powerhouse of the Army and the new champions the Royal Air Force. How they continue this development is a little bit of an unknown and uncharted territory for them as it is the first time the Women’s team have had an enforced break to their Inter Service rugby. Unlike the men who faced the suspension of games after the 1939 championship as war, not virus, ravaged Europe.
If matches had been played in 1940 the Navy would have been going for their 3rd Inter Services in a row. Two wins in 1938 were followed by an Inter Service title delivered through a draw with the Army after a close win over the RAF. The winning team in 1939 were, like the Women in 2014, led from fly half, this time by young Geoff Vavasour. However, it was the play of the backrow, again not unlike 2014, which secured the victory where internationals Watkins and Crawford, on the flanks, closed the game down as the Navy’s defence held out for the win. At lock that day was Dalglish, who along with Number 8 Hammond, had been called up to HMS Excellent as part of mobilisation preparations for gunnery officers, in case the political situation turned worse. As history shows it did and after a six year break the Navy were slow out of the blocks, in 1946, and were unable to make it three Inter Services titles in a row, emulating the sides of 1920-22. Vavasour was not to feature in a Navy jersey again although his qualities were demonstrated on numerous occasions in the war, twice mentioned in despatches and awarded the DSC. However, the defensive effort of the team in 1939 was probably nothing like the defence he needed when he was stranded for nearly 26 hours on the Dunkirk beaches as the Navy sought to help the British Expeditionary Force evacuate. The RAF provided much needed top cover for Admiral Ramsay’s force of Naval vessels and of course the ‘little boats’.
I am sure that looking at the teams lists from the 1939 Inter Services there were one or two Army players on the beaches, being covered by a couple of players from the Air Force overhead as Lt Vavasour tried to make sense of the confusion he faced as Beach Officer at the sharp end. The same is probably happening in today’s confusion caused by Covid-19. With all 3 Services representative rugby sides having players who have deployed to help either the NHS of other Civil Ministries, all rugby is on hold and today’s Geoff Vavasours are finding themselves in situations they simply did not expect to be. How will, hopefully a much shorter, break effect the Navy sides? The Men, like the Women are an evolving side and Scott Makepeace’s team are at a very different stage in their evolution to Vavasour’s. The team of 1939 were beginning to decline, would they have won in 1940? We do not know. The 2019 side showed promise under their new skipper and the win at the Stoop was comprehensive and clinical whilst their performance at Twickenham showed their inexperience. 2020 would have been a fascinating campaign but that is all on hold and it will be interesting to see how the team resume their progress when rugby restarts for the next season. Exciting if uncertain times. In 1946 the RAF shaded the win, 9-6, on the Inter Service resumption but I feel that the Navy will be in a strong position with both Men and Women’s team benefitting from an extra season’s development together. Until then we can but wait until Covid-19 restrictions are lifted and Service rugby players return from their deployments no doubt eager to get back on the rugby field and prepare for the 101st year of Inter Service Championship rugby. The 100th year since the tournament including the RAF started has certainly been memorable!
By line: Geraint Ashton Jones
Images credit: © Alligin Photography