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| Will Birkenhead Park be celebrating again come Saturday? |
| One of country's rugby founders is coming home |
| 11 April 2008, 12:49 pm |
| By Dan Pritchard |
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| Birkenhead Park are one of the country's oldest rugby clubs, forming back in 1871. But Saturday's EDF Energy Intermediate Cup final is their first appearance at the home of English rugby. |
Birkenhead Park Football Club have a staggering 138 years of history behind them, as they set out to win their first ever Twickenham cup final.
The club have produced 43 international and 317 county players and played host to their first international, Ireland v Wales, in 1887 at the ground where they still play today. England took on Wales there in 1894 and a North of England side played Romania on the same pitch nearly a century later, in 1984.
But all that counts for nothing when Saturday’s EDF Energy Intermediate Cup final against local rivals Chester kicks off at Twickenham Stadium at 10am.
But how do you get the best out of a set of players who have had a month building up to the biggest game of their lives?
Jon McNally, Birkenhead’s Director of Rugby, admits that it’s hard.
“We have tried to take the focus away from the place and focus on the opposition. For the quarter and semi-finals against Staines and Bracknell, the focus was all about ‘North v South’. But that game at Staines – Twickenham Stadium was only a couple of miles away! So people start thinking about if from the quarter-finals.
“For the final, Chester are just 20 miles down the road, it’s a local derby so we’re focusing on that.”
Not only is it a local North East derby transplanted several hundred miles south, but Chester have just been promoted to join Birkenhead in North League One.
But despite winning the last eight previous encounters, McNally expects a close game.
“We’ve watched Chester and expect them to try and spin the ball wide at every opportunity and try and run our big forwards to tire us out. We will try and keep possession and basically try and bludgeon them to death! But if it doesn’t go all our way up front, we have a back line capable of playing some exciting rugby, as we showed in the Cheshire Cup final win.”
In that game, Birkenhead ran in at the corner to score the winning try with seconds on the clock.
And as to picking who plays and who doesn’t?
“It’s enormously hard. The final say comes down to be but we have a panel of selectors with coaches and the captain. We’ve been fair. You have to pick the strongest team you can. Normally we tell players one at a time but for this, we posted the team list up at the club and people could find out in their own way.
“We wanted to do it right. It’s the biggest game of their lives, it’s the club’s biggest ever game. It should be a fantastic day - two teams, with a good relationship, two great sets of fans. We can’t wait.”
Steve Donovan, head coach at Chester, is equally excited about Saturday’s final.
“The club has never been to Twickenham before and the excitement levels are very high. It is difficult to keep the players focused. But we’re top of the league and to get to the final against our near neighbours is the icing on the cake. It’s been a great season.”
And just like Birkenhead Park, Chester are clear about their game plan.
“We play very open and will be looking to run the ball around. It’s going to be a wonderful pitch, lots of open spaces and we will be hoping to exploit that. Both teams know each other quite well and we’re certainly not weak up front.
“There’s a great feeling around the place, attendances are up, the column inches in the local papers have shot up and people are talking about the final all the time. It’s raised our profile tremendously and that can only be good for the club going forward.” |
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