Boots and all | Isaac says Valley not motivated by revenge ... but HKCC better watch out
Grand Final grudge match or not, players are keen to exert dominance up front
Is it a grudge match and will there be a whiff of revenge in the air at King’s Park on Saturday evening when Societe Generale Valley face off against Leighton Asia HKCC for the Grand Championship silverware?
Not so, according to Valley’s head coach Jack Isaac – the former Australia sevens captain and one-time Biarritz coach – who believes in letting bygones be bygones.
“I don’t think so. We’ve moved on a bit from that. A final is not about revenge, it’s just about winning,” Isaac said when asked if Valley would be doubly motivated to win because of what happened the last time the two sides met.
For those of you returning from Mars, HKCC’s 12-7 win over Valley in their final HKRFU Premiership regular-season encounter was clouded in controversy, with accusations that the Aberdeen club had bent the rules with 10 minutes left by going for a no-push scrum (legal in itself) as they claimed all their front-rowers were injured.
Well and good, if not for the fact that one of their front-rowers was on the bench for the HKCC second stringers in a later game. He even came on for one scrum.
The end result was a lot of unhappy people, leading to HKCC taking matters into hand and standing down their team management and the player concerned for one match.
