As Metropolis rugby  club's bus  turned right onto I94 to head straight home, I hope they recognized that they had been in a quality game. It would have been a pleasure  to have shown metropolis  our graciousness  and hospitality in defeat, had they decided to attend the aftermatch. They  did have  a long drive home , one that  must have felt better due to their efforts in the final minute of the game.

Metropolis  with this win will move into second place in the west and are still in the hunt for that Midwest 2^nd seed  for the nationals.

The game began perfectly for Metro  and they lead after a quick try in the 3^rd minute  and   began to apply large pressure on the harlequins defense. 5 minutes  in the crowd was rewarded when the home team finally had any opportunity to penetrate into the metros half and were rewarded with a penalty within 10 meters of the tryline. The quins opted as they did last week to take the scrum and push it in. phillepe leka went over for the try and even the game.

The rest of the half saw an advantage for reasons to metro at the rucks and breakdowns.  Strong had defense  kept the score to 14-7 and then at the end of the half dom singleton in an individual effort intercepted a play and went 70 meters for a try and the half finished 14 all.

The second half saw metro  come out firing for some more open continuous play and having success in off loading in the tackle while the harlequins looked to gain some control at the breakdown. 20 minutes to go metro had 2 more unconverted tries and a 10 point cushion and may have felt they had control of the match.  Pressure  at the break downs and  a good team build up was finished off by some entertaining passing by the quins back three that saw Cyprian Shimenga go over in the corner, with Phillippe Leka's conversion 21-24. Metro  came back to put the hammer in the coffin with a quick drive down the field  for another unconverted try  to extend their lead out to 8 points with 10 to go.

For a spectator the whole game should have been an enjoyable experience of watching fast entertaining rugby, the next nine minutes of play from the Quinns  were some of the teams best. The cohesion and interaction of the team lead to some well structured phases of play  that saw Collins Akwanyi put on his dancing shoes and reward all of the quinns pressure with an unconverted try. Nice effort but the  quinns were not finished, we had not come to division one  to be a make up game , we had come to win. That  mindset saw the lead finally swing to the harlequins when  mark fine went over for an unconverted try  to change the score to 31-29.

From the kick off  the harlequins secured the ball and ran  some tight phases to run down the remaining minutes on the clock. With time up the ball was turned over and metro took full advantage and scored the finally try of the game right between the posts.21-36 finally score

The cliché  that rugby is an 80 minute game  was born  from games like this.  Also saying such as " stealing a game" " playing 16 against 15" also come to mind but the one I would prefer to mention  is that I saw a team that lost  but was far from beaten. I saw a team that after the game, quickly turned from the emotional frustration of rulings on the field to discussing areas the team excelled and looked at  how to capture missed  opportunities.  This  team  demonstrated an emotional maturity  to continue to focus on their play as the crowd  turned their attention to  missed calls and perceived injustices.  I will apologize  to the team and our supporters as my weakness as a coach is I become  emotionally involved in the game and verbally irate when I see  hard earned advantages being removed by illegal play. This emotional attachment is more due to the fact I am sharing an emotion  I believe any  retired  or active rugby player has when watching  this team of late- one of Jealousy .

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