The electric atmosphere becomes tangible, the crowd erupts with pure elation at the sight of thirty men proudly wearing their colours: red and white; red and white; red and white and red and white. Thirty slow seconds tick by before three tiers of patriotic supporters sing in unison, a choir at their Saturday worship singing without even truly knowing the meaning. Without even knowing the language. One child, a bold painted dragon clawing around each cheek, attempts word after word in a language he only hears on the weekends.

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As the song slowly fades away and the other anthem begins, jeers and chants begin from the higher tier but explode like a fireball from the crowd below.

The feel of elation dies swiftly and only tension is now evident on the reddened, flushed faces of middle aged men. The awkward silence lingers and the giants on the grass limber up; anxiety creeps from stand to stand, until every wide eye craves the same oval of leather.

As soon as the ball whistles high into the skies and sails there, the game is already half over. The pristine white kit of the opposition is ominously fresh and uncreased; a commanding lead intact on away soil. Mouths already begin to savour the thought of victory.

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The anthem was really loud and the players were running about like crazy, the announcer was getting dead excited at this point and started almost screaming at the top of his voice: Try!

The patriotic anthem begins to rally again, the headbanded back row raise tired heads. Sweat smokes from their jerseys in the cold early evening. ‘Will everyone in Stand Twelve ple…’ the announcer stops his appeal mid sentence - Wales are breaking back, pushing the English back…Williams on the ball…Still Williams…Still…..

The patriotic anthem started to raise higher in the stands as the players started to make inroads into enemy territory. The emotion in the announcer’s voice was reaching fever pitch as Wales were heading towards the try line. This was heaven for me!

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The shopping centre had never been so busyas it was the Saturday before Christmas. Peoplewere fighting over the last goods in Iceland.Argos was heaving with staff running roundgetting gifts, and anxious people waiting to getTo the next shop. Staff in Debenhams were redin the face wanting to get undressed because thetemperature was so high with all the people andwork getting done. You could see so manywomen carrying too many bags and the tightmarks this left around their fingers.

This is an excerpt from a D grade piece of descriptive writing on: A Shopping Centre on a Saturday afternoon.

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The awkward sign stood proudly offering information thatnobody even cared about. People only realised it wasthere when they were only a few inches away fromstumbling into it. Murmurs of ‘watch out’ and the frustration of ‘why the hellis that there’ were common yet nobody would come andmove it.Gift sets and ‘2 for 1 Offers’ screamed out from Boots butthe shop was already packed. Hostile territory forany inexperienced shopper.The reality of how much people had spent had not kickedin. This could be seen in the bright zeal of the shoppers’eyes. And their mouths. And their locomotive bodies. Itwas Christmas