RAVENHILL’S A COLD PLACE WHEN THE SUN GOES DOWN

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Day’s like These

Sunday week ago, buoyed by Ulster’s long awaited return to form of sorts I set out on my bike for a long cycle in chilly conditions, with the sun beginning to heat the air.

I don’t wish to go all Coney Island, step into the mystic, take astral weeks to explain it but there’s gonna be days like these. I climbed a raking slope of a road up towards Scrabo and onwards to where the sky met the road.

Cresting the hilltop was what it was all about. Spread below me lay the highly manicured fields that make up a small fertile plain at the head of the Lough. A long undulating road stretched in front of me, falling towards the Comber – Newtownards carriageway and beyond, to a small island connected by a causeway to land.

I descended into bright sunlight at, (for me at any rate), a lofty 25mph. All the little rigours of life faded and fell away in that headlong descent. Being briefly aware of another cyclist, descending in my slipstream, it was one of those moments in time that makes up for all the bad weather and the lung bursting rides into a headwind.

There’s gonna be days like these.

Enough of the reverie, I was thinking ahead to last weekend’s Heineken game against Clermont and I recalled past days. Then, the sun was shining, (didn’t it always?), on a freshly laundered Ravenhill, the flags flying in a stiff breeze, the laughter of people on a day’s license to enjoy and above all the rugby, when things clicked for the Ulster team.

There have been a few days like these, when everything seemed to go right. Days like a certain Sunday when Leicester felt the force and wilted to a 33nil defeat. When the mighty Toulouse collapsed 33-3, when Stade Francais wilted in the pressure cooker of Ravenhill any number of times or Biarritz unable to summon those extra points to edge a tight game.

How would Saturday’s game against Clermont ASM pan out?

A Day to Remember For Some and Others, One to Forget!

Saturday on the morning of the match, dawned a bright clear sunny day, with just a few wispy clouds trawling the horizon.

A good omen!

My two guests from France had arrived on Thursday evening. Jean Luc a Frenchman from the Clermont Ferrand region and Phil Baker a Welshman from the same area.

This was Phil’s 3rd time at an Ulster Heineken game and Jean Luc was visiting Ireland for the first time. After a quiet Thursday evening spent eating dinner, drinking wine and exchanging chat, with Phil showing off his translation skills for us and Jean Luc, we headed into Belfast on Friday morning to sample culture and cuisine.

The first day in the big smoke for the intrepid duo started with a Titanic fry and both men sank a plateful of egg, soda bread, bacon etc with considerable relish. Having suitably bulked up we moved on to the Belfast Bus Tour, which interestingly enough failed to make it as far as the dry dock where the Titanic was built.

The dock’s an edifice which is quite inspiring and a piece of industrial architecture of which I have a reasonable detailed knowledge. More so than the murals and shrines to the troubles that litter other parts of Belfast and for which I have little time.

Visitors to the city do have a fascination for the murals and shrines, hence the popularity of bus tours, even in deepest November.

Fired up by the terrible beauty, the paradoxes of the peace-line and the historical intricacies of Belfast, I suggested a break in the Kitchen Bar. There Jean Luc sampled fish, chips and mushy peas and the comparative delights of a fish supper plus an obligatory Guinness or two.

Owing to the amount of walking done it was not possible to sample a real fish and chip shop such as John Longs. Following a tour of the Ulster Museum in late afternoon, we headed back to the house for dinner and the Connacht match.

As a preliminary to the big game on Saturday afternoon, it was a pretty good appetiser. Harlequins were made to work for their victory.

Would Ulster subside against the might of the French Top 14, as Connacht had done against the current Aviva Premiership no. 1 team?

Ravenhill’s a Cold Place When the Sun Goes Down.

Having sampled another Ulster fry on Saturday morning we were headed to the Crown Bar for pre match preliminaries. Halting briefly outside Robinson’s we picked up another ex-pat who was back home for the match.

There followed an hour of roistering in the Crown Bar with the Clermonties in full cry, including an English rendition of Stand Up. Their own battle hymn to ASM sounded somewhat like the Marsellaise but with added gusto.

Clermont fans proved to be genial and welcoming folk, if on the youthful side and Jean Luc, finding himself amidst his native Clermonties, (though wearing an Ulster shirt), was in full cry.

There were Clermont fans in the Errigle when we arrived there to meet up with Royster and they seemed to be thoroughly enjoying themselves. So was Jean Luc, who by now was probably a couple of Guinness short of being pissed.

The match had a good atmosphere, bar two women standing behind me, one of whom claimed she was bored. I checked her pulse in the second half as the game’s tempo increased and she was still close to lifeless!

You can’t please some people.

With Ulster lasting the pace longer than Clermont, they finally prevailed in a tough physical encounter. Sadly Jean Luc was, in the aftermath of the game, becoming increasingly tired and emotional.

His first trip to Ireland, one of unusual cultural events such as the Ulster fry and laced with a touch of home, proved too much and at 7pm he retired to the pit.

As I remarked to Phil on the way out the door, “Ravenhill can be a cold place when the sun goes down.” It certainly was for Clermont

Days Like These

Having left my guests towards the airport about 7.30 Sunday morning I headed back home whilst noticing the increasing number of cyclists, lights winking in the semi darkness of dawn. One especially ephemeral image was that of a peleton of about 25 bikes, lights blinking, ghosting through Dundonald, like a silent train.

Once again buoyed by the scent of an Ulster victory I headed out on my bicycle towards Lisburn in the gloom of an overcast day. Briefly the sun shone in a laboured sunburst over the fields near Lisburn before I turned towards Ballynahinch under a cloudy damp sky again.

As I pedalled through Hinch a peleton of 30 bikes rounded a bend, this time to a cacophony of barked commands and the clicking of gears.

There would be no seminal moment such as I experienced the previous Sunday in the sun. Instead it was a steady slog into a headwind and the occasional glimpse of blue sky.

Rather reminiscent of Ulster’s season so far.


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