Profile of Paul Sullivan

Well would you believe it? No sooner had we finished Matt's profile than that charismatic captain of Exiles replied to our questions and supplied us with his latest photograph. Funny it reminds us of someone, but we just cannot think who, Paul must have a double?
Anyway enough frivolity let's subject this genial of men to a severe grilling.

What Nationality are you?
English
Your Position/s?
12
Your Age?
33
International Caps?
2 Sweden
When did you start playing?
way too long ago! Moseley Under 9´s
What are your plans for the future?
an international try and a happy retirement, but not quite yet!
Has the season lived up to your expectations?
pretty much, again it was the northern teams setting the standard, a little dissappointed in the strength of the southern teams this year, although good to see Spartacus join the ranks and try to develop
How do you think the next match will go?
Tight. 4 points is nothing but gives them a slight edge. as far as we are concerned it is nil all, a genuine cup final - as it should be in the first place. time to put an end to two legs for a grand final? Korsängen is a great place to play with a fantastic atmospere, and an even better place to win!
What has been your highlight of the season, so far?
reaching the final in a tense encounter against hammarby
What has been the lowpoint of your season?
losing to our closest neighbours, twice.

Any comments you might like to add?
Thanks True Sweden rugby for your efforts to balance things up, breath of fresh air and well overdue!!

Cheers, Sully

Our thanks to both captains responding to our questions in what must be a pretty hectic week for them. We wish both teams good luck and look forward to a good match.

Profile of Matt Youngman

One of the topics we have been discussing in the office is, should we feature profiles of players on the blog. Well the ayes took it and we then had to decide who we should feature first. We believe that Matt Youngman has had an enormous impact on the pitch this season and as one of the captains in Saturdays finale we are delighted to feature him. It would have been nice if he had kept his clothes on for the photo session ;) but we guess that it might please some of our readers.

So here's Matt's replies to our questions.

What Nationality are you?                    
New Zealand
Your Position/s?                                   
hooker/ inside center
Your Age?                                           
25
International Caps?                               
0
When did you start playing?                 
started playing at 10 years old.barefoot rugby up in whangarei!
What are your plans for the future? 
Staying involved with ERK and would like to get a couple of caps with the national 15\7s team would be sweet.
Has the season lived up to your expectations?
definetly the season has gone really and the team has lived up to there expectations.
How do you think the next match will go?  
i feel if we can execute our game plan and keep our discipline a win is definetly on the cards for us :)
What has been your highlight of the season, so far?
making the final has been a real high point for us considering the start we got away too.
What has been the lowpoint of your season?          
the huge break in the middle (holidays) its a killer.

Thanks to Matt for responding so quickly. In all fairness, we did ask the same of the Exiles captain, but so far we have received no reply.

Swedish Men's Squads

At last the waiting is over and the squads for the forthcoming tests have been named. In our opinion they appear to be very strong squads and it's clear that Mike Tatu has put a lot of thought into this. What a pity though, that Stockholm Exiles have only one representative, why is that?


Truppen till Hollandsmatchen, Pilevallen 15.00 lordag 31/10

Viktor Pettersson	Enkoping RK
Bobby Nave	Enkoping RK
Olof Wadell	Enkoping RK
Tobias Borg	Enkoping RK
Matt Youngman	Enkoping RK
Tim Johansson	Enkoping RK
Ricky Okpu	Hammarby IF Rugby
Mattias Thorhard	Hammarby IF Rugby
Richard Johansson	Hammarby IF Rugby
Fredrik Casselhag	Hammarby IF Rugby
Roger de Jager	Hammarby IF Rugby
Rikard Ornberg	Vanersborgs RK
Alan Letele	Vanersborgs RK
Peter Wiklund	Vanersborgs RK
Alex Taylor	Nuneaton RFC
Andrew Daish	Nuneaton RFC
Sebastian Taylor	Old Haberdashers RFC
Lee Sandberg	North Walsham RFC
Paul Matthews	Goteborgs RK
Jan Olof Johansson	Spartacus RFC
Paul Sullivan	Stockholm Exiles RFC
Magnus Macdonald	London Scottish
Reserver pa hemmaplan:
Thomas Ardvisson	Fredriksberg RK
Hannes Ericsson	Hammarby IF Rugby
Eric Wickstrom	Hammarby IF Rugby
Andreas Bruhn	Goteborgs RK
Setareki Tegunimataka	Pingvin RC
Linus Hector	Vanersborgs RK
Ledare:
Peter Svensson	Team Manager
Mike Tatu	Forbundskapten
Mike Hale	Assistant Coach
Kari Tapper	Assistant Coach
Mats Nolkrantz	Physio
Bengt Lund	Material

Truppen till matchen mot Malta, pa Malta lordag 7/11

Viktor Pettersson	Enkoping RK
Olof Wadell	Enkoping RK
Tobias Borg	Enkoping RK
Matt Youngman	Enkoping RK
Tim Johansson	Enkoping RK
Ricky Okpu	Hammarby IF Rugby
Mattias Thorhard	Hammarby IF Rugby
Richard Johansson	Hammarby IF Rugby
Fredrik Casselhag	Hammarby IF Rugby
Roger de Jager	Hammarby IF Rugby
Rikard Ornberg	Vanersborgs RK
Alan Letele	Vanersborgs RK
Peter Wiklund	Vanersborgs RK
Alex Taylor	Nuneaton RFC
Andrew Daish	Nuneaton RFC
Sebastian Taylor	Old Haberdashers RFC
Lee Sandberg	North Walsham RFC
Paul Matthews	Goteborgs RK
Jan Olof Johansson	Spartacus RFC
Paul Sullivan	Stockholm Exiles RFC
Magnus Macdonald	London Scottish
Thomas Arvidsson	Fredriksberg RC
Reserver pa hemmaplan:
Hannes Ericsson	Hammarby IF Rugby
Eric Wickstrom	Hammarby IF Rugby
Andreas Bruhn	Goteborgs RK
Setareki Tegunimataka	Pingvin RC
Linus Hector	Vanersborgs RK
Ledare:
Peter Svensson	Team Manager
Mike Tatu	Forbundskapten
Mike Hale	Assistant Coach
Kari Tapper	Assistant Coach
Claire McKenna	Physio
Bengt Lund	Material

Jennings handed 12-week eye ban

Shane Jennings has been banned for 12 weeks after being found guilty of eye-gouging London Irish lock Nick Kennedy.
The Leinster flanker was cited following the defending champions' 12-9 Heineken Cup defeat to London Irish on Friday night in Dublin.
Kennedy reacted furiously to the incident during the game and accused Jennings of poking a finger in his eye, although he later claimed to have over-reacted.
At a European Rugby Cup Ltd disciplinary hearing in Dublin today, Jennings was found guilty of acting 'contrary to good sportsmanship in that he made contact with the eye or eye area of Nick Kennedy'.
The judicial officer Roger Morris from Wales decided the offence was at the low end of the scale and, having taken into account any mitigating and aggravating factors, he banned Jennings until January 6, 2010. Both parties have the right to appeal.
Jennings will miss eight matches for Leinster, starting with Saturday's Heineken Cup trip to Brive and including the back-to-back European encounters with the Scarlets.
He will be available again to Leinster for their Magners League game against Glasgow at the RDS on the second weekend of January.

In our view, there have been too many instances of this type of offence recently and we hope that it is not introduced into Sweden.

Food for Thought.

We were contemplating in the office this evening and eventually arrived at what we felt was a very important question. Do we have pizza or burger and chips? Now you might think, what has this got to do with Swedish Rugby? Well so did we, until like a light of bolting, it hit us. Do the players in this country take their diet and nutrition seriously enough to balance their needs, when it comes to health and fitness? Of course there will be some that do, but how many others seek advice regarding this? After all many players get advice regarding fitness training, but diet and nutrition, we just cannot guess. Be interesting to find out.

Countdown to the Women's World Cup. Begins!

We are pleased to see the publication of the players invited to the first training camp at the end of this month, which will be held in Goteborg. Some surprise omissions and inclusions in the list, with quite a few old faces and a few new ones. The returning FK has obviously his own ideas formulated presumably, from his previous experience in charge. As they are due to play Wales in November, it will be interesting to see who is selected for that trip. We would hazard a guess, that it probably will not be much different from the victorious EM squad, but like a lot of others, we will wait and see.
The next question that we have and it may be viewed in some areas as controversial. is, who will be the Captain? Will Jonas stick with the current incumbent, or go for someone completely new? There are one or two ex-captains who are on the list, or will he be bold and choose an unknown, for example 'Ygge' who, on her day is the outstanding forward in the country and had a sensational EM. We guess only time will tell.
The Squad is:-
Jennie Ehlin          Ulrika Andersson Hall    Ellinor Borjeson O'Brien
Lotta Abrahamsson    Jessica Berntsson     Erica Storkenfeldt
Sandra Eldfast            Anna Holmstrom      Susanne Nilsson
Henrietta Hogberg     Johanna Gustavsson  Sara Sexton
Jennie Ohman            Anna-Lena Swartz    Carolina Madsen
Lina Engdahl              Lina Matsson           Kerstin Lovendahl
Amanda Sandsborg   Louise Ericster         Annika Hector
Pauline Sarg              Elin Wallstrom          Ninni Giebat-Johansson
Jenny Sahlin              Fia Framling              Lina Norman  
Emma Wallering       Karin Hedlund           Minna Ahlstrom
Anna Larsson           Lina Olofsson            Sara Akermann   
Rebeka Sundell        Alexandra Johansson  Jennifer Lindholm
Malin Ericsson          Madeleine Lahti         Susanne Olofsson
Johanna Norberg      Therese Forsberg       Zofia Pershon
Katarina Bohman      Sofia Torstensson      Lotta Westin
Jennie Olsson           Malin Johansson         Elisabeth Osterberg
Elisabeth Ygge          Erika Andersson        Frida Rydberg  
Sofi Bjorkman          Jessica Melin              Elin Pettersson
Victoria Svangren     Cecilia Burebrink       Christel Fredriksson
Rebeka Lind          Rebecca Stafhammar    Karen Grudd               

So a predominance of players from Exiles and Goteborg, but will they all survive the cut to the squad?

Seconds Out, Round Two

After some careful consideration and a bit of subtle editing, which may or may not have included the use of a dictionary, we have now completed the reviews sent in by our ace reporters who were match side for the first of the finals. As the Ladies kicked off first, we thought that they should get top billing. Told you we were fair, so no accusations of sexism from the men please.
With bated breath, the excited mass of onlookers watched the gladiators take to the pitch, both teams were looking nervous as did the officials. Of, course the two coaches, Oscar and Guy probably had a slight tension in their stomachs also, as they neared the end of a long and tiring season spent training their respective athletes.
Uppsala started brightly and held the upper hand for the first quarter but without bothering the bright new scoreboard. Just after the quarter, Goteborg struck with a breakaway try and that signaled a complete turn around in the match. With Goteborg's confidence rising and Uppsala's wilting, the result was starting to appear to be a clear win for the team from the West. Guided by the experienced hand of their Fly Half, they started to mount up the points and although entertaining the close fought encounter that everybody predicted, didn't happen. Although in the latter stages of the match, the visiting team again started to dominate the play, it was to little too late. It would be a brave person to forecast Uppsala turning things around at home next week, but they did succeed two weeks ago. So can Guy can once again perform his magic or be outdone by Oscar? We shall see after all being 32-8 down is a big ask.

Due to a pitch invasion by a group of kids. Sorry, what was that?, (oh,that meant to read a display of Tag and Youth rugby. Actually it was entertaining to watch, well done to all those that took part.)

The Men's final kicked off a few minutes late, on a far from perfect surface, with water lying on top of the pitch in some areas and the field looking very heavy. This was going to have an effect on players as the game wore on, but right from the start Enkoping tore into Exiles and played at quite a fast tempo. One thing that stood out in those first twenty minutes was the dominance of the team in White. It soon became apparent that Exiles were struggling to play their game and could not get any decent ball. They were struggling at the set piece and were being outplayed in all departments. It wasn't long before Enkoping crossed the whitewash to score and continued to do so throughout the first half, with Exiles managing just one penalty. Just before half-time Enkoping mounted a ferocious attack in the Exiles half that contained some tremendous continuity, had they scored then, it would have probably sealed the match, but some heroic defending by Exiles resulted in the end, to a penalty being awarded to the Men in Black and they cleared their lines to end the half.
The majority of the crowd were discussing what the final score would be and if Exiles could keep the score below an achievable target . Few would have guessed anything else.
However, with the Exiles supporters, which included those Hammarby players that had only just lost to them the week before, Exiles started to turn the game around. More experienced players came on, the forwards started to get parity in the scrums and began to win their lineouts. The Enkoping forwards were starting to wilt and as a result lost their discipline, which eventually led to a yellow card against them. A couple of good scores reduced the lead and but for a missed penalty and a forward pass they would have taken the lead. Eventually Enkoping managed a penalty score in the second half, which was just enough and they kept the lead by 4 points to end 17-21 winners at the final whistle.
The referee had a fine match and controlled the game well and we hope that next week's will be as good.
An entertaining match and we are looking forward to the finale.