Happy New Year

Moor returned to league competition after the 2-week Christmas layoff with a visit to Trafford Metrovick at their base on Finny Bank Lane in Sale and hoping to reverse the 31-38 defeat they suffered at Green Lane back in September. With a number of notable omissions from the side due to unavailability or injury, coach Mark Edwards nonetheless still had a useful squad of players to select from and chose to include a couple of Colts players, including one, Hasham Gondal, making his 1st XV debut off the bench.
The visitors started the liveliest and had opened their account within minutes. This came from the home side's kick-off, which Moor collected and immediately ran the ball back via their three-quarter line to take play deep into the opposition’s half, resulting in an attacking scrum on the 5-metre line. This was won and the visitors proceeded to drive MV back towards the try line, allowing No. 8 Tom Ireland to pick up and cross for a try, converted by skipper and fly-half Danny Child from the touchline. Following the kick-off, Moor again attacked only for centre Chris Ogden-Smith to make a break and when stopped, Ireland was up in support to receive the pass and score his second try under the posts, converted by Child. Another kick-off and another break out by Moor, this time by full-back Matt Hughes who joined the line at pace and he then fed back-row Jimmy Hine, who in turn put scrum-half Ben Haspell away under the sticks for the third converted try. During this period, other than at kick-offs and one occasion when Moor rather carelessly lost the ball in a ruck, only for their opponents to kick it back to them, MV had not touched the ball and yet found themselves 21 points adrift after only 10 minutes of the match. The game then settled down and although Moor still continued to test the opposition, especially their lively back line, they were unable to make further inroads, due in part to MV, now having recovered their composure, mainly keeping the ball amongst their forwards and to Moor's frustrating ability to give away penalties when in possession. In fact, it was the home side that had the majority of the play for much of the second quarter and were camped for long spells in the Moor half, but the latter’s defence held firm. It was not until the final minutes of the half that Moor resumed their try-scoring spree by adding two further converted tries to their tally. The first was set up and scored by right-winger David Adebo, who had been proving somewhat of a handful throughout the game, when he looped around to the left wing to create an overlap and burst through, taking play up to the opposition’s 22. When halted, Hughes was on hand to take a pass, but some desperate defence managed to stop him just short of the line and MV managed to get the ball into touch. The resultant line-out was won by Moor and it was Adebo who again popped up on his opposite wing to take a pass and jink his way over for a try. Now in injury time at the break, Moor produced a repeat of their earlier try-scoring sequence as they attacked from the kick-off and a delicate chip over the advancing defence by Ogden-Smith allowed fellow centre Alex Tupou to collect a fortunate bounce and touch down under the sticks, to give a commanding 35-0 lead at half-time.
The home side’s woes were further increased not long after the restart when they had a player sin-binned and unsurprisingly, Moor elected to take a scrum from the resultant penalty. This was easily won and the ball was spun out to Adebo who had the simplest of tasks to run in and score in the corner; the attempted conversion proving to be the only one missed by Child during the game. Midway through the half, a 30-metre run by Colts player Trevor Chappell on the left wing took play deep into MV territory where the move was continued by Ogden-Smith, who then produced another telling break to set up replacement full-back Kingsley Child for a converted try between the uprights. Although the match was well and truly over as a contest, MV continued to make a game of it and were finally rewarded with a converted try some ten minutes before the end, as a result of some slick handling following a line-out, which took play first one way and then the other. The visitors were not finished however, as on the stroke of full-time, they produced a number of phases of play involving most of the team, ending with Adebo crossing for his third try and Moor with a convincing 54-7 victory. Although he did score a hat-trick, MOM did not go to Adebo but to evergreen Ogden-Smith who produced a impressive performance from start to finish for one of such advancing years.
Moor have no fixture next week, but return to league action at Green Lane on January 19th against Aldwinians.

David Todd