Old Alleynians 32 - Beccs 19

As this was a last minute arranged development game, I was not going to worry about reporting on Sunday’s events however staring down the barrel of 2 hours of “Dancing on Ice” I decided that the performance of the boys merited a report.

With a full schedule of games lined up at Becc’s for the Juniors, all the mini’s at home, and possibly several teams from our new footballing neighbours, when Old Alleynians contacted us for a development fixture at their place we jumped at the chance.

With a large squad Alleynian’s were keen to let a number of their non-regular league players get a run out, we also had a number of players who had not played last weekend against Esher who could do with the same. This would also give us an ideal opportunity again to try people out in different positions.

So it was on a cold, overcast , damp January morning we headed over to Dulwich. First up role call it was clear that school matches the day before had taken their toll, with our 2 scrum halves and one prop being unable to play due to injuries. In addition a number of bleary red eyed individuals led me to suspect that not all had been tucked up in bed at a sensible hour the night before. That being said all took to the warm up well, though speed of thought and reactions were somewhat slower than usual.

It was at this point that their coach advised us that in view of the poor weather before Xmas they were very keen to give their A team a run out before the League’s get underway. This caught us somewhat by surprise , however always up for a challenge we took to the field as originally planned . For the third week in succession we must have lost the toss as we received the kick off having to play up the hill in the 1st half.

From the off it was clear that despite the conditions of the pitch (more reminiscent of a bog) both teams were going to try and run the ball. After the Alleynians first try by their electric winger who gassed it in from their 10 yard line, you could soon see why they were keen to do so. Not surprisingly with both teams eager to play there were a number of knock on’s. Becc’s in particular were guilty of all too often forcing the pass (some of which were not good). Invariably after some strong runs by the forwards ( in particular Joe, Josh and Richard) whenever we ventured in to OA’s territory we ended coughing up possession. This was made all the more frustrating when with a couple of overlaps on, we chose not to throw the pass. Had we put a number of passes away when we should have, things might have come out differently.

For any of the lads reading this, we have to start believing that we have the ability to build the passages of play, our rucking when we put our mind to it is second to none, believe me. There were several glimpses of it on show today where we smashed OA’s of the ball, Armie , JackT, Josh and Joe when you hit the rucks they do move, and this creates the momentum for us to win our ball easily and on their ball sets up the counter ruck.

It was after one such instance when we made some great ground, got into their 22, set the ruck up, quick recycled ball , spun out by Fred , quick Hands along the backs , Harry in the corner, Jack sticks it over 7 points “ Simples”.

Sadly the hard work was all undone when from the restart we spilled a fairly simple ball for which we were duly punished. OA’s with their tails up pressed and pressed us into the bottom corner. Eventually the pressure paid off as they crashed over for their 2nd try. Thankfully their kicker had left his kicking boots behind and with the whistle blowing for half time we went in at the turn 7- 10 down, which in view of the error count on our side we were delighted with. It was a credit to our defence that we had kept the score line down, the back row of Joe,Joe and Josh were doing a great job at bringing people down, and the back line is starting to master the art of the press defence.

With the slope in our favour we hoped that the 2nd half would bear us some fruit providing we cut out the error’s. With a whole host of changes and the coaches wise words ringing in their ears we hoped that the tide would turn. We still looked strong in the backs and we were starting to boss the contact areas more, however as in the first half we persisted to offload under pressure, with pretty much the same result. To compound things a number of boys started to struggle with knocks and with forced substitutions we were starting too lose our shape. OA’s picked up on this and in a 15 minute spell midway in to the second half saw them run in some well worked try’s ( 4 in total with only one converted).

We were now down to our bare 15, and Sean and I were delighted to see the players character start to emerge, it was clear that we were not going to give up the fight and the remaining 15 started to throw all we had at Alleynian’s. After one passage of Play Jack Thompson cut through the defence to take us down into OA’s 22, from here we retained the possession forcing the ball over the OA’s line with Jack eventually forcing himself to the ground for our 2nd try of the match on the stroke of 24 minutes. Conversion duly made.

From the restart we saw pretty much the same after Kameron had made some great ground into the OA’s half , two passages of play into the centre of the park ruck on the 22, recycled ball , quick hands Jack Townsend over in the corner uncontested. “sound’s familiar” ? Unfortunately we were unable to make the kick, and that was that as the ref blew for full time. A scoreline 19 – 32, coaches and players ruing what could have been, but hey that is “Rugby”.

Special mention must go to Fred, who was thrown right in at the deep end and did a great job for us at 9 today, on a sticky pitch with untidy ball it was a big ask and you stepped up to the plate. It was also good to see a number of people come on and start to look comfortable in different positions such as Joe Lopez, also good to see Naeem developing as a player doing a solid job at lock after such a short spell in the game.

All credit to the players to keep heads and discipline and keep on going to the end, as ever the Dad’s and WAGS were out in full support.

Best of Luck next week at WPRFC, sadly your roving reporter is roving round the Links in Portugal.

Doug