First blood to Southam

Since the opening fixture, away Pinley, Leamington continue to search for that seemingly elusive second win, to kick-start their league season. Having competed with two of the top sides recently, Rugby Lions and Silhillians, hopes were buoyed by a home game, with newly promoted Southam the visitors. However, an opening half an hour that went catastrophically wrong for the hosts ultimately confined them to another pointless return.

Southam were on the score sheet as early as the fourth minute, as they stole Leamington’s lineout ball and swept play across the field, at pace. Centre, Tom Grimes, grandson of Leamington stalwart, Tony Grimes, took possession, drew in the home defence before slipping a neat pass to his wing, who raced in for the try.

With Leamington unable to mount any semblance of an attack in the early part of the match, the visitors went further ahead with another, unconverted score on thirteen minutes. This time, Southam ran the ball up the nearside wing and although Leamington seemed to have stymied the move, the visitors regained possession and dived in at the corner.

Leamington’s first real threats came when Tom Jewitt set debutant, Kenny Kwok up for a run and shortly after, a quick penalty by Sam Nunn nearly caught the Southam defence cold.

Although still lacking cohesion at this stage, Leamington had only conceded 10 points and they looked as though they had got themselves back into the game with a try, typical of their undoubted abilities. Southam gave away a penalty deep in their half and the quick-thinking Craig Smith took possession, broke through three tackles and dived over to get his side back in to contention. When Jewitt nailed the conversion it looked as though the home side were back in business.

However, the restart brought more problems for the hosts. Craig Smith fielded the drop out ball cleanly and set it up for what would normally be a simple clearance. Disappointingly for Leamington, as the ball was moved inside, a mis-field gave Southam possession and the easiest of chances to increase their lead.

Just before the break, Southam had another opportunity to score when their break on the far side flank almost caught Leamington out.

Half Time: 7 – 17

The second half brought little early respite for the home side as Southam immediately broke down the wing and scored in the nearside corner.

Whilst certainly not the restart Leamington wanted, they did set about forming a positive response. Their back-row of Smith, Lewis Kelsey and Gareth Shuttleworth, had once again been on good form all afternoon and a break by Kelsey got his side in a good position. The Leamington pack set about an onslaught on the visitors line and were only kept out by some superb defensive work from Southam. During this strong passage of play from the hosts, prop, Scott Peters nearly got over the line, stopped only by a last ditch, try saving tackle.

This spell, around mid way through the second period, was certainly where Leamington were at their sharpest. The introduction of Peter Blunt had steadied the ship and the team were now mounting quality attacks and playing to somewhere near their capabilities. Importantly, they forced another score, capitalising on their possession. With the pack pressing the Southam defence, Harry Gooch, Blunt and Kelsey exchanged quick passes to give skipper, Craig Smith, just enough room to force his way over. Jewitt coolly slotted over the conversion and with just an eight point gap now, it was game on.

Entering the last fifteen minutes of play, nerves were on edge and whilst Leamington had their fair share of possession of play, with some good running from winger, Connor Chamberlain and with their forwards having more control now, Southam remained resolute in defence. They also still had more to show in attack and a swift passage of play from their back line opened up the Leamington defence and allowed another score in the corner. This latter score proved too much for the hosts to recover from and when an attempted attack by them in midfield came under pressure from Southam, they lost possession and once again the visitors had the simplest of tasks to run in and score under the posts.

Full Time: 14 – 34

Next week, Leamington give up league duty for a return of Cup rugby and host Olney, kick-off 3.00pm.