He had seemed, in that game against the Harlequins, to possess every virtue that should belong to the ideal three-quarter--pace, swerve, tackle, and through them all the steady working of the brain.

Nevertheless those earlier games were yet remembered against him, and it was confidently said that this brilliance, with a man of Dune's temperament, could not possibly last.
But, nevertheless, the expectation of his success brought him up, with precipitation, against the personality of Cardillac, and it was this implied rivalry that agitated the College.

It is only in one's second year that a matter of this kind can assume world-shaking importance.
The First-year Undergraduate is too near the child, the Third-year Undergraduate too near the man.

For the First-year man School, for the Third-year man the World looms too heavily.

So it is from the men of the Second year that the leaders are to be selected, and at this time in Saul's Cardillac seemed to have no rival.