Cougars "Fight Back"
Falls Short

The Lead-Up
After a successful BC Cup defense only a few weeks earlier, a buoyant and confident Vancouver Cougar team loaded up into 5 minvans/SUV’s and made their way down to Seattle for yet another "must win" home and away game.

The early surprise was the level of supporters who turned up for the journey. At one stage it looked like they were going to outnumber the players. With a few late withdrawals, including a shock "no show" from the Big Irishman (who was expected to make his usually last minute arrival straight from the pub from the night before), Cougar’s fill-in SuperCoach, Guru Edmonds, was seriously eyeing off some of the supporters as potential players. In the end, the 20 players who had arrived were considered enough of a team to get us by, and we were off.

The road-train hit the first snag at the border crossing. With the convoy already running well behind schedule, a very upset little Border guard did not agree with Chops McGrath that a team split over 5 minivans constituted a "bus" and pointed an rather aggressive finger back towards the hour long car line up. Not to be out played by this little upstart, a magnificent piece of "cutting in" by Blocky and Brendan saw all five vans cut 50 minutes of the queue and in no time we were back on the road.

With a late arrival, the team was forced into a hasty preparation in order to get ready for game time. Under no circumstances did the team want Seattle to get away to a fast start like they had in the most recent H&A game in Langley.

The Game
Unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened. Despite a slight drizzle, the ground was in good nick and the ball flowed well. From the opening bell, Seattle was firing with all guns a-blazing, achieving some magnificent linking work through the centre and plunking it on the chest of their "Man mountain" full forward – Andrew Donlen. "Locks" Paquin was wearing him like a glove (albeit a very big glove), but could do nothing against such magnificent delivery. The Cougars had a couple of chances early but the Glamour Boy (clearly not having enough time to do his hair before the game), was slightly off and snagged a couple of behinds from easy set shots. The Grizzlies were handling the small ground better than the Cougars and continuously drove the ball forward. The Backline were as always doing their all to keep the ball out with B&F Coops, Morgs, Dave Taylor, Nelson and Blocky making some nice plays. However, the backline was thrown into some disarray when a mis-cued head butt by Chops McGrath landed on teammate Blocky’s nose causing him to go off with a bloody nose. Despite this, Fists was doing his bit through the centre to try and get the Cougars on the board.

At the end of the first quarter, the Grizzlies lead 5.1.31 to the Cougars 0.3.9

Quarter 2
The 2nd quarter quickly turned into a war of attrition as the Cougars centre line start to dig in and play hard-at-the-nut footy. As always, Chops McGrath, Shine Edgar and Handyman Hilton were throwing their bodies into packs to try and scramble the ball out for the Cougars. Jim Utting was starting to fire up, and newboy Canadian Cam was proving he’ll be a player of the future, making sure he was getting amongst it. Still, Seattle would not let the ball penetrate the Cougars forward line and managed to maintain a sizeable lead at half time.

Grizzlies – 7.1.43 to Cougars 1.6.12

Quarter 3
What happened in the next quarter can simply be described, as Cougar brilliance at it’s best. Fill-in Super Coach "Guru" Edmonds made two of his most tactical moves of the day by throwing little used Glamour Boy Vargo into the Ruck and then putting himself to the Back Flank (after a lengthy 4 game lay-off due to a broken toe) to rejoin his partner in crime on the other flank - Coops. The moves paid off instantly. Despite conceding at least 5 inches to Seattle’s big John, the "diminutive" 6’2 Vargo, started to dominate the tap out’s and Shiner, Col, Jimbo and Timmy lapped it up and pumped the ball deep into the forward line where Fists and another newcomer "Shiny Shorts" John Hoad were proving a handful. With the rigid backline repelling everything, it was time for the Cougars to unleash some fury. Vargo banged a massive goal in from the centre square which was quickly followed by a long snap from the boundary by Stratford. With additional goals to Skip Freeman and Nelson Ferret, the Cougars were on a rampage, having held Seattle goaless for the quarter, and went into 3 quarter time only 7 points down.

Grizzlies 7.3.45 to Cougars 5.8. 38.

Quarter 4
Seemingly on a roll, the Cougars went with the same lineup for the 4th quarter to try and put the Grizzlies away for good, but Seattle was determined not to let their hard first half work go to waste. An early last quarter goal saw them sneak out to a 13 point lead. The entire Cougars team was still giving their all, but the Seattle resilience was strong. Some magnificent work out of the backline and the centre saw Skip Freeman slot one home and The Wiz got a deserving free after some great body-on-body work to score his first ever goal in Cougars colours. With a few minutes to go, the crowd was going ballistic as the Cougars got it within 2 points. However, it was not to be their day, as the Grizzlies steadied for another late goal, and the game was theirs.

Final Score – Grizzlies – 9.8.62 to Cougars 7.9.51

Best – Coops, Blocky, Fists, The Wiz, Nelson, Locks Paquin, Chops McGrath

Goals – Glamour Boy Vargo – 2, Skip Freeman – 2, Goalsneak Jase – 1, The Wiz – 1, Nelson – 1.

After Match Function
With the "driving home crew" pre-determined, and the Cougars comfortable that, despite giving their all, Seattle was simply too good on the day, a relaxed Cougars team looked to make some serious dints on the beer supplIES at the Kangaroo & Kiwi Pub.

In no time the Cougar boys and their associated Cougar girls were warming up nicely after a few Coopers. Shiner as is now customary, pulled out his Didgeridoo and entertained the gathered masses. Partner of the Prez, Fiona Mitchell caused an early uproar when she presented a pair of mystery jocks that were found dumped at the ground. It could not be determined what was more shocking – a) that someone had left a pair of their jats holders at the ground or b) that Fiona had handled said jocks. The jocks in question were later found to belong to a high profile senior member of the team (keep an eye on BCFooty.Com for more of this saga later this week).

Whilst a number of the boys quickly began to carve up the pool table, Cougar’s newly crowned ladies man, Jim Utting, had made a bee-line for a group of Seattle girls who had accompanied Seattle ruckman John’s wife. Clearly not happy with the local Seattle offerings, it wasn’t long before the girls took a keen eye on the magnificent specimens of men (that are the Vancouver Cougars) and joined the boys at the pool table. The games were disturbed at one stage as Annaliese demonstrated her dance moves on the top of the pool table. These going’s on were mostly lost on a certain member of the Cougars captaincy core and a particular ruckman who were progressively destroying drink after drink at the bar.

It was around 12-1pm that finally the last 3 buses left the Kangaroo & Kiwi and headed off on the long ride home.

BCFooty.Com has learnt that for the second successive trip home Skip Freeman, who had earlier declared, "I will not fall asleep", managed to last 15 minutes before falling fast asleep. Thankfully this time managed not to spill beer down the front of his pants.

Footnote
Don’t forget, if you’ve got a story from any Cougar’s post-match function that you think should be reported to the team as a whole (or else just to take the piss out of a fellow teammate on an unrelated matter), don’t be afraid to let our little muck-racker the Whisper know about it – thewhisper@canada.com If you're not comfortable with writing a story just provide the details (or even a rumour) and The Whisper will be happy to embellish the story from there!

Also, if anyone has photos from the weekend we'd love to get hold of some for the website. Just send them to: webmaster@bcfooty.com