Bishops Castle & Onny Valley 15 Aston Old Edwardians 17

There was an absolute gale blowing in Bishops Castle and Aston were delighted to win the toss and elect to play with the wind. From receiving kick off Darren Gardner caught the ball and immediately made use of the wind by kicking the ball downfield placing BC under immediate pressure. Aston attacked from the resulting 22' and BC conceded a penalty in front of the posts which was easily despatched by Ethan Channer 3-0. Aston were then guilty of trying to play too much rugby in their own half and conceded a penalty from a breakdown which was successfully converted to make it 3-3.

From the kick off Aston were again put under pressure by strong running from BC that have an effective game plan of attacking around the fringes of the breakdown using single ball carriers. Aston were guilty of allowing the ball carriers to run at them rather than moving forward as a defensive line to meet the ball carrier. As a result whilst tackles were made BC constantly made ground up the field of play. After a 10 minute spell of pressure in the Aston 22' we finally obtained a penalty. An ill-advised quick tap penalty led to a turnover and a penalty to BC that was kicked to the corner. A strong maul later and Aston found themselves 8-3 down.

This appeared to prompt the team into action and Julius Hunt led a charge downfield and offloaded to a supporting Nick Whiteman who made 10 metres and managed another offload to Craig Williams. In his second game in a row at centre, Craig managed to complete a Sonny Bill Williams-esque offload to Ethan Channer who scored in the corner. A superb touchline conversion from Ethan Channer made it 10-8 to Aston. Eager to capitalise on this period of pressure Aston finally began to use the gale force wind and kicked downfield. A penalty was conceded which was taken quickly by Julius Hunt and he was stopped just short of the line. Ian Lyons sensibly used the ball to go wide and Jerome Jadoo made a superb pass to Emric Elmhurst to score under the posts. Another conversion made it 17-8 at half time.

The second half was tough going. BC used to wind expertly and kicked Aston downfield and remained in Aston's 22' for almost 30 minutes of the second half. Aston just couldn't get out of the 22' and Aston's defensive effort was truly superb. Ethan Channer, Julius Hunt, Andrew Coveney, Darren Morris and Darren Gardner were excellent in this period and made tackle after tackle. It says a lot that this Aston team doesn't just give up under pressure but all players stand up to be counted and fight for that victory. In the end, despite a late (and well deserved score) from BC which was converted (17-15) a victory and 4 points is all that matters at this stage in the season. Herefordshire is a difficult place to travel to and win and two wins away in last month against Church Stretton and Bishops Castle are very satisfactory.