After 10 minutes of this match, I was starting to fear that we were going to head into Bakewell for our Rugby Dinner later in the evening with a heavy defeat to our names; too much roast dinner (too near to kick off, again!), two or three boys under the weather, a far from impressive warm-up and a large athletic opposition all combined to see us let in two soft tries in quick succession. What followed was one of our most impressive performances of the season.
Trent College U/13’s are unbeaten in two seasons and have recently beaten both Spratton Hall and Ranby House by huge margins. But for one moment of lost concentration following Alex W’s injury, we would have matched them try for try for 40 minutes of this game. A fantastic achievement in any circumstances, but to do so from 14-0 down with so many boys not at their best was outstanding!
Trent had a number of large athletic boys (as you would expect when choosing from 70 in each year) and were very well drilled, supporting each other well and moving the point of attack quickly away from our defence. Despite that, after the opening two tries when our tackling was quickly back to our usual high standards, we caused Trent problems at every breakdown with our excellent rucking and sharpness over the ball. Our scrum improved as the match went on with both Lewis H and Cameron D gradually getting the upper hand against their opposite man, and the pressure began to tell as Trent’s play became more and more ragged. It was also pleasing to see our backs running hard, taking sensible options and supporting each other at the breakdown.
Our points came from hard work form all the team providing quick ruck ball for Charlie S to exploit gaps in the opposition defence with speed of thought and fleetness of foot.
This was truly a team performance of which the boys can be proud. Well done to each and every one of them and a big thank you to Jacob Bradbury for bravely agreeing to come on as a substitute for the final 10 minutes of the game.
Posted on
Thu, November 24, 2011
by Admin