Scabs won't celebrate
Dan Scarbrough has vowed not to celebrate if he scores against boyhood club Leeds Carnegie on Sunday as a Saracens win will push the Yorkshiremen to the verge of relegation from the Guinness Premiership.
The wing spent three try-laden seasons at Headingley before joining the Men in Black in 2004 and he has followed their progress ever since.
However, after winning promotion back to the top flight at the first time of asking last season, Stuart Lancaster's whipping boys look certain to swap places with Northampton Saints in National League One next season after a torrid season has yielded just two wins from 17 games.
For Scarbrough, who was born and raised in the nearby Bradford town of Bingley, it is a sorry sight to see his old team, then known as the Tykes struggle to get to grips with the Guinness Premiership for the second time in three seasons.
He was their leading try scorer in the 2001/02 season, a fact which alerted then England coach Clive Woodward who handed Scabs' his first senior international cap against Wales in August 2003. His all-time try scoring record for the club, 37 tries, was recently equalled by Leeds wing Tom Biggs.
"It's always nice to come up against Leeds as they are my home club and, outside of Saracens, I am very fond of them," said the 30-year-old, who can also play at full-back. "It's gutting to see the position they are in and I'm sure they would happily swap places with us. I think they have got to win every game to have a chance of staying up and while you can never say never, things don't look good for them."
Scarbrough is no stranger to this situation. He was in the Saracens side that edged his former club closer to the drop almost two years ago as the Men in Black held out for a 17-13 win to ease their own relegation fears.
"It's never a nice thing to do but I would rather it be them than me," said Scarbrough. "If I cross the line against them this weekend I won't celebrate."
If Carnegie are destined to go down then they are doing so with a fight. Last weekend's stunning 16-15 win over Newcastle Falcons saw Lee Blackett score the quickest try in Premiership history - 8.28 secs. The result took them to within ten points of Worcester with five games to play and Scarbrough says Saracens must not take them lightly if they are to get their faltering play-off push back on track.
"Leeds have proved themselves to be a decent side at times this season," added Scarbrough. "They've led in their last four or five games but, apart from the result against Newcastle, they've not been able to hold on.
"If they do go down then I'm sure they can bounce back and stay up. They first time they were promoted and went back down a lot of their players left and the solidity in the team over the previous four or five years disappeared.
"The people in charge have been loyal to the players that got them promoted last time around and I think that will stand them in good stead in the years to come. I definitely think the future can be bright for them."
Scarbrough has had his own season of torment to deal after a serious knee injury sustained at the start of the season has curtailed his involvement. He returned to action against Harlequins last month and is determined to play a crucial role in helping the Men in Black recover from their February wobble and last Saturday's crushing 30-3 EDF Energy Cup semi-final defeat to Ospreys in Cardiff.
"The last three to five weeks have not been fantastic for us, but we've slowly started to build things back up," he commented. "It was painful at the weekend though. Ospreys did a bit of a job on us and everyone was disappointed after the game because another chance for silverware has gone begging.
"It was a reality check but we know we're a good side that doesn't become a bad one overnight. We've got to move on quickly and get over it."
Ospreys visit Vicarage Road for next week's Heineken Cup quarter final and Scarbrough says Sarries must focus on their own performance and not dwell on their cup defeat.
"It won't be so much of a revenge thing when we play them here as they beat us fair and square in Cardiff," he added. "We've got to play better to beat a team of their calibre."
In the meantime, Alan Gaffney's men are eying a hat-trick of victories against Leeds having already won the reverse fixture 31-7 and an EDF qualifier 46-28.
"This weekend is a massive game for us as a win will keep us in the hunt for a top four position," continued Scarbrough. "We're expected to win but no game in the Premiership is easy.
"We've got to go out there and win it - it's not going to just happen. We've got to play well and front up and really taken the game to them. They will come at us hard for the first 20 or 30 minutes, but if we ride it out and get some points on the board we will have them."
12:15pm Friday 28th March 2008
Print 
Email this
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
