In a more normal ending to this season, for Chris Robshaw's last home game, The Stoop would have been packed and we would all have stayed behind after the match to salute a club legend and Harlequin great. Many of us would have loved to be there but alas it is not to be. But the facts don't change and Robbo has served Quins with distinction for so many years. I became a Quins fan at the start of the Andre Vos era and Robbo could have had no better a mentor of the backrow arts. Vossie was a gentleman off the pitch but hard as nails on it and so consistent in his performances. Robbo seems to have learnt well! As we know, Chris learnt his rugby playing for Warlingham RFC juniors, and being an East Surrey man myself it just adds a little connection. Thanks for all the memories Chris, but especially a MOTM performance in the Premiership Cup final.
We know that Robbo was hurt bad by the 2015 RWC exit but as fans we share that scar together. And how good was it that after that he went on to share in some outstanding England performances as a worldclass 6.5! So as Chris leads out the Quins team one last time at an empty Stoop tonight I am sure Quins fans all over the Home Counties will be applauding him from afar. The boys will want to put in a big performance tonight......
Any thoughts on a trip over to San Diego (or even New York - bit closer) en masse to give him a proper send off when the situation allows?
I'm pretty sure we'd be able to make ourselves heard in an MLR crowd.
It's a real big, or should I say massive shame we could not be their to show him our appreciation.
Don't think anyone can say in words what we all think of Chris that a great cheer could.
I'm am very honoured to have been around and seen him develop into a great player, person and wish him the best for the future.
It was my (hold back the tears) privilege, you will be missed!
Club legend, fabulous player, absolute true gent off the pitch, will be sorely missed....good luck Chris! (Sorry I couldn't let your mIssus down the steps to see you last game!, I had my instructions!!)
It's difficult for me because I will always see Jason Leonard as the greatest Quin. The reason for that is that I played against him as a school boy and saw him go on and become the most capped player in world rugby and from talking to him at Barking RFC was how I started supporting Quins, even though he went to Sarries first, he thought very highly of Quins. He went on to have an amazing career and the John Smiths/Parker Pen shields and first European honour were how we measured success then.
That said I cannot explain the magnitude of the impact that Chris Robshaw has had on our club and us as fans. This quiet, unassuming bloke helped to drag us through a difficult time in 09/10 and emerged as a strong leader of men. I was so pleased with the European Challenge cup victory in 2011 and thought that an amazing achievement and his performance was exceptional on the night. To then see him ignored by England was harsh but to see what that did to him as a player and leader in 11/12, I hadn't seen anything like it. He was immense in the final and then followed that up with those outstanding performances in South Africa.
Seeing that the world was at his feet and on 1st January 2013 he must have woken up dreaming of another league title, European glory, Six Nations title and Lions captaincy. To see all of that taken away from him one by one but not due to him or his abilities, he continued to be outstanding, was heartbreaking.
For a man of his ability to not have a Lions cap is a disgrace and why I'm a massive advocate of a points based qualifying system for Lions selection rather than the nepotistic views of a national coach.
I cried for him in 2015. The whole setup of the squad was wrong and the coaches should never have worked in rugby again. They allowed disharmony and factions in the camp and threw Robshaw under the bus when it all went, predictably,
**** up.
All the pretenders have come and gone and he still shone through as they all slipped away one by one. We will not see his like again at the Stoop and that worries me but when his retirement plan in San Diego is over, we need him back inspiring the next generations at Quins.
Sir, it was a privilege to see you in quarters and you will always be a deity in South West London. Salute.
I'd second most of that, though not the level of vitriol against the England coaching setup. They made mistakes, and Chris took most of the flak (for which I tend to blame the press at least as much as the coaches), but it's clear from what all of them have done since that they still have a lot to offer to rugby.
Anyway, Will Greenwood tipped Robshaw as one to watch after our of our early Challenge Cup matches on our return from the old ND1, and I watched him closely from that point on. His arrival wasn't as obvious as that of Mike Brown (who took a firm hold of the 15 shirt from his first senior appearance and seems to have no plans to relinquish it any time soon), but it quickly became apparent that his undying workrate was something that would mark him out as a key player for Quins. He was a player whose value was hard to spot on the pitch and showed itself primarily in stats, analysis videos and as we can see from the tributes in tonight's matchday programme, in what he did for others off the pitch. Even when he made a break, it was usually characterised by a slightly startled look on his face as if he'd never expected to find himself in that position.
But while the highlights reels focus on the big hits, the outrageous steals and the charging breaks from other players, what we came to appreciate as Quins fans was how much better he made the team work and just how often when we needed a loose ball recovered, a scrambled tackle or a crucial turnover it would be him emerging from the pile of bodies with the critical play.
As a matchday reporter for CAW I remember sneaking into a press conference - it may have been the Quins v Leicester pre-run of the final in 2012 - where Conor O'Shea described how, even having been his Director of Rugby for several years, he still could not believe the amount of work the man got through. The Monday morning video analysis would be punctuated with "How did he manage to get THERE? Again?"
It's telling that, having served under four Quins DoRs and three England regimes, he was as far as I can remember only dropped twice. Once by Martin Johnson, in favour of 2003 stalwarts who failed to deliver, and once by Eddie Jones when by his own admission he rushed his return from injury and couldn't deliver the level of performance that Eddie wanted. That he won over coaches as diverse as Deano, COS, Lancaster and Eddie says quite a lot.
In the end, it's fitting that the match that most sums up his contribution to the club is the one that perhaps represents their joint greatest achievement. Rugby is the teamiest of team sports and it's hard for an individual contribution to stand out over 80 minutes. Usually, there's room for debate over who the Man of the Match was, but in the 2012 Aviva Premiership Final there was no doubt. If the "two Robshaws" joke was already in common currency among Quins fans, this game cemented it with Chris playing both flanker and first receiver, in the process causing all sorts of problems for the Tigers' defence. It was both a great performance for the team and one of the greatest individual sporting performances it has been my pleasure to watch.
It was fitting that he scored a try that was the difference between the two teams and in keeping with his dual role it was both typical of his style of play and absolutely unlike it, taking a cheeky pass from Danny Care as he trotted innocuously back into the line and then diving over before anyone else knew what was happening. Even more fitting was the final act of the game. Does anything sum up Chris Robshaw better than emerging with a crucial turnover under pressure to secure the victory?
Thanks for everything, Chris, and good luck for the future. We were lucky to have you and we will miss you and your dedication to the cause. You will always be welcomed back here with open arms and offers of pints, and your position as one of the greatest players ever to pull on the quarters is one we wholeheartedly support.
I was going to write something about Robbo but after that from poorfour I feel it would be rather inadequate. Well said sir .
I think it's fair to say all England fans held him in high esteem, good luck to him.
Life long Quins fan here now living in Los Angeles. One of my best mates from London happened to move to San Diego when I moved here. We were thrilled to hear about Robbo moving to the Legion.
We will definitely be there for the first game he plays that fans are allowed to attend so if any of you are planning on coming out then please let us know!
Chris Robshaw's career can be measured by the noble manner he handled failures
And it was then, in the months that followed, that Robshaw showed the best of himself. He fought his way back into Jones’s team, on the blindside flank, and, along with Haskell, was an outstanding player in that grand slam spring of 2016. The two of them played the best Test rugby of their lives that year.
Robshaw was a relentless presence, linking play, leading England’s tackle count most weeks, doing all the dirty, thankless work that goes under-appreciated. My lasting memory of his career won’t be that he failed, but of the way he handled that failure. And if Jones did not exactly admit that he was wrong, he ended up making him captain again, for a one-off Test against Samoa the next year.
Robshaw has been through it, and out the other side again, a better player, but an unchanged man, as honest and diligent and down to earth as he always was.
That's a great summary. Though I'd quibble slightly about whether he became a better player in the sense it's meant. He continued to improve, but it wasn't as if there was a sudden step change.
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