Ok, so its now Friday morning and time for my struggling memory to recall the events from last Saturday. So here goes……

In typical AXV style the few of us who met at LMA started our trip to Battersea Ironsides late, but happy having learnt Anton Kriel had made himself available at the last min and would meet us there. Those in the know will tell you, trying to get across south London on the weeks leading up to Christmas is a slow and dull task, unless of course you have the Legend (Julian Chenery) in your car with stories and jokes to keep everybody amused.

We arrived at ground, and found the elements of an already assembled team (Still missing a few) in a changing area big enough for two dwarfs and their cat, but cosy never the less.

Having got changed and walked five mins down the road to the pitches we meet the ref who seems somewhat disappointed that we had arrived and even more annoyed when I explained we still had two to arrive (Paul Murphy and Gareth Pritchard). The said two made their tactful arrival with only two mins to kick off. As a result of the slightly disorganized arrival time for a warm up was limited and we started the game unprepared for what was about to ensue.

The game started and Battersea Iromside (BI) took full advantage of our unorganized start by putting us under early pressure and winning a series of soft penalties. This went on for some 20mins during which they scared two comfortable and although I hate to say it fair tries.

Finally Old Mids began to get into the game and started taking the fight back to the oppo, with solid running from Anton Kriel and Steve Berry. Gradually the penalty count began to swing the other way as BI consistently lay on the ball and not rolling away in the tackle resulted in a 1st yellow card of the afternoon.

Mids sustained the pressure and after a successful line out, a couple of drive by the forwards the ball was spun wide down the line to the arms of Gareth Pritchard to score in the corner. Half time 12 – 5 down and the game was on.

The 2nd half started like the end of the 1st, Mids putting pressure on, and making solid ground. Of the line out, Adam Stammers made a fast break up the touchline, but was pulled down 5 meters short of the line in a desperate tackle for the BI full back. Sadly this was the last we saw of Adam as he damaged his knee in the same tackle. On came the always-impressive Sam House!!

Mids continued to attack with good effect, with a series of play seeing Andy Edwards crash over the line to score. Everybody thought he had, except for the Ref who deemed the ball had been held up. With BI feeling the pressure the game started to get a little heated with a few handbags, and words of encouragement being exchanged! These exchanges lead to what has to be one of the funniest sights I have seen on a rugby pitch. Gareth Moss, playing one of the best games I have seen, was called a fat……. Not one to let it go, he stood proudly in the middle if the pitch, lifted his shirt and started slapping his belly shouting “Yeah I’m fat come on!!”

As the gamer began to come to an end BI stated to out some pressure back on our defense and having defended our line for some time they ran in the final score of the day leaving a score line of 19 – 5.

We went to this game knowing it was going to be tough, this oppo was at the top of the league and smashed us off the park last season, but not today. This was clearly a missed opportunity and should have been another win for the team. Our change in results is coming, and we will start seeing the AXV led by our leader Simon Jupp start working our back up the places