Bruising encounter won by more streetwise team

The seconds travelled to Water Orton, quietly confident of giving a good account of themselves against local rivals Salts in the first merit league game of the season. A few enforced last minute alterations to the side meant Aston arrived with the bare minimum of fifteen. New signings Freddy Britain and Damien Moore making their Aston debuts, and with Mankit Yau elevated through the sides, resuming his second team career after initially being selected in the fours.

Receiving the kick off, Aston began the game well with Gareth Roberts and Andy Ryley making some hard yards, the pack recycling the ball well under the direction of scrum half Dave Pleaden and managing to stretch the Salts defence with a number of driving phases of play. With a stable platform provided by the scrum, with the Yau managing to steal a couple of balls against the head and the first couple of lineouts safely secured by Andy Jacobs and Paul Glenn, it seemed the 2s had learned their lessons from last weeks defeat by Leamington.

Salts managed to weather the early pressure and began making incursions into Aston territory, with the home sides rapid centres stretching the visitors drift defence, winger Sam Bradley made an heroic try saving tackle to keep the home team at bay.

However, Aston finally succumbed to the constant pressure applied by Salts, eventually going over in the corner for the first try of the afternoon, unconverted by the Salts fly half.

Wave after wave of attack was repelled by the well disciplined Aston defence, and the half ended with the visitors trailing by just the solitary try. Salts utilised their replacements well, bringing on a number of strong runners and carriers. An up and under from the Salts centre was exceptionally caught by full back Josh Gorman, however a failure to call the mark in the 22, combined with a lack of support resulted in a penalty awarded to Salts for holding on. With the cover defence scrambling, the Salts centre took a quick tap and glided in under the posts unchallenged for a converted try.

Aston regrouped at the kick off and a number of pick and drives resulted in a penalty, duly converted by Sam Bradley. The visitors continued to put in a spirited defensive effort. However the Salts 13 was allowed to run unchecked through three defenders and scored what the visitors would consider a fairly soft try given their previously sound defensive organisation. This was quickly followed by another score for Salts to bring the score to 22-3. Aston continued to carry the ball into the Salts defense through Lewis Cooksey and Paul Bradley crashing the ball through the middle and centre Pete Haliwell making some incisive runs on the outside. However Aston were unable to trouble the scoreboard further and Salts held out for a deserved win.

Still plenty to work on for the 2s. The realisation that the second team merit league is going to be every bit as tough as speculated during preseason has highlighted the importance of attendance at training to work on set pieces, defensive and attacking patterns. Unfortunately, man of the match Dave Pleaden suffered a torn calf muscle playing football on Sunday morning and is likely to be out for the rest of the season. We wish Dave a speedy recovery.