KCRFC V BERFC

KCRFC As

Kilburn threw away their perfect season with a dismal second half display on Saturday. The first half saw Kilburn score 4 tries and secure the try bonus point one of these tries from a set piece move which started on the Kilburn try line and finished with number 8 Steve Owen generously giving Aly Bursey the try, which he could have scored himself. All looked well heading into half time, with Kilburn leading by 26-7.
Barnet’s only points of the first half coming from a driving maul off a line-out, which functioned well all afternoon. Kilburn, at this stage, had been reduced to 14 men, with try scorer Aly Bursey sent to the sin bin for illegally bringing down a Barnet maul moments earlier. This set the tone for the second half, where Kilburn’s indiscipline and the referee’s fondness of yellow cards meant Kilburn spent 30 of the last 45 minutes playing with 14 men. Crucially, the penalties gave Barnet field position, which they used well to set up their driving mauls and with the extra man advantage scored 4 tries of their own.
Barnet clearly in the ascendancy at this point, found another gear found themselves in the Kilburn 22 again, following more indiscipline from the Cosmos. This time Barnet managed to sneak over the line from a scrum to take the lead. Kilburn in shock from going behind rallied and worked the ball up the pitch before crossing the line in the dying seconds, only for the referee to disallow the try and bring Kilburn back for a penalty against Barnet. Despite their best efforts Kilburn couldn't get over the line again. Kilburn lost the game 33-26, their first defeat of the season, although as they only lost by 7 points and scored 4 tries, they did manage to take 2 points from the game keeping the gap between them and second after Cheshunt and London Welsh (2nd and 3rd respectively) drew collecting only 2 points each.

Kilburn comments from Andy Hutt:
After taking the lead almost too easily in the first half it was really disappointing to see us switching off like we did in the second. Barnet are a strong side and better than their league position identifies, over the last two years we have always had close encounters with them. They play a very contradicting style to us and this was definitely seen in both halves of the game on Saturday. We were attacking in an open nature and scored with relative ease in the first half, Barnet kept it tight and used the extra man for the majority of the second half to great advantage upfront. Unfortunately for us the 3 yellow cards were a huge blow, saying that our performance in the second half was lacklustre and we will be looking for improvements and for individuals to raise their game if they want to keep their spot in the side.