The annual clash of titans was held on Saturday at the club between the under-30 and over-30 players.

A rough and ready bunch turned up for the annual battle at 12noon.
Although some of the more experienced players decided to have a quick "eye-opener"
before the match.

Most worrying perhaps, was that referee Jonas was on his third beer before kick-off.
A ragged looking bunch of Under-30s were representing the uglier members of the club.

The over 30s were made up largely of mid-life crises sufferers, people escaping from the wife for an afternoon,
and those who really should know better.
Joining the under-30's for the day were 4 Spanish exchange students who had travelled from Skovde to for the match.
No doubt they expected to find a slightly more professional approach to the game.
At this level, stretching was optional.

The match got of to a fast and furious start with the younger players
scoring two tries without reply.
The over 30s players found it hard to keep
up with the vigor of the fitter younger lads, like Peter Norlander,
who is clearly accustomed to chasing skirt at high speed!


A dramatic turnaround came about 15 minutes into the game.
The "oldies" had kicked possession into touch for about the 10th time.
Janne Johansson, ever keen to keep the ball in play, looked for quick ball from the winger
to start another attack. At the same time, Cormac O'Brien, who had been
wandering around aimlessly for most of the game so-far, anticipated this move.
Cormac was later to attribute this rugby epiphany to
"the few beers I had before the game, and the fact that Janne is always up to something sneaky".
Cormac hit at the same time as Janne collected the pass.
It was probably more the shock of seeing Cormac actually tackle someone,
then the ferocity of the tackle that forced Janne to spill the ball,
but spill it he did.
What followed was a foot-race to the line, which our Irish prop won.
Referee Jonas was too far away from the action and too drunk to see if
Cormac actually grounded the ball, so the try was awarded.

This seemed to spur on the oldies, and a second try
(probably scored by Micke, I'm not really sure) soon followed.
The game then followed a pattern of poor refereeing decisions, cheating in the rucks,
mass substitutions, and aimless kicking. Scott scored a try for the oldies;
Peter grounded one for the young bucks. It all got a bit hazy after that, so I'm not sure who else scored.

What I do remember is that the oldies were down by 6 points and needed
a converted try to win. With the clock winding down, a surge by the oldie's pack
(made up entirely of props at this stage), created good ball for Cecil McLaren.
His inch-perfect pass, put Cormac (another prop) through for his hat trick try.
With the conversion under the posts to come, the geriatrics
has surly done enough. Not quite. Micke missed the conversion,
hitting the post, in what surely has to go down as the worst conversion ever taken.

Somehow (and I'm sure there was cheating involved in this),
Krille managed to get the ball from the restart, and run 60 yards, handing off two people
in the process to score the winning try for the oldies.
How a Finnish international was allowed that much space is a question that needs answering.

So the game ended 37-31 to the oldies.
As is tradition in Spartacus, Karl was hit in the face by a team-mate,
with Casper doing the honors this time.
The drinking went on well into the night...