Away at Chipping Sodbury

It was a cold and misty morning in South Gloucestershire with the Green Army from Frampton Cotterell descended on a damp and slightly muddy pitch for the short trip to Chipping Sodbury.

The pre match entertainment was mainly provided by Ned’s new Mr Motivator pre match warm up routine for the boys. This seemed to work well despite Gab’s ballerina impressions !

The hosts were a few players short at this age level so requested they use a couple of players from their under 12 team. Fram were happy to oblige despite one of the players being considerably bigger than any of the other boys playing today.

From the start Frampton pressurised and their persistence paid off when after some strong work from Nikolas, Matt found space to dive over for the first score of the day. With Jack converting Fram led 7-0. Some good defending by Fram ensured they kept the lead and they extending the score following a scrum, the ball was worked wide and Jamie picked up to push through and score, this time George converting to end the quarter 14-0.

The second quarter was a more evenly contested game and following a penalty to Chipping Sodbury the ball was passed to their under 12 player whose superior size and strength enabled him to run through and score which, following the conversion narrowed the score to 14-7. Fram persisted though and nearly scored again but Jamie’s try was pulled back for a previous infringement.

It was the same story in the third quarter with both teams giving 100%. Frampton made every effort to get the ball wide with Olly, Ben and Is waiting to pounce on any opportunity. Chances were few and far between for these strong teams but it was Chipping Sodbury that made the breakthrough when they broke the Frampton line to score, and tie the score following the conversion at 14-14.

It was all to play for in the final quarter but straight from the kick off Jamie caught the ball and ran through to score with a powerful run, Jack converted the try to give Fram a 21-14 lead. Some great tackling followed from Marcus, Charlie, Gab and Callum with the highlight a great diving tackle by Leo to bring down the bigger under 12 Chipping Sodbury player. Fram’s strength proved too much however as Jamie went over to score for a hat trick of tries for the day and with George converting again it made the final score 28-14 in Frampton’s favour.

A huge thank you to the coaches for waking the boys up and whipping them into shape before the game and for the vocal support of the parents on the touchline as ever. C’mon the Fram !