Manor Park 12 – 13 Southam – Warwickshire Shield

A much changed Southam went over to Manor Park with an injection of last years colts, started up the slope and were immediately 7 points down from a charge down in front of the posts. Southam then buckled down, but had to defend for almost 20 minutes as they struggled to gain good possession, the defence was good with strong tackling from both junior and senior players, but they eventually succumbed to another try after 15 minutes. Southam then put together a number of good phases, but could not retain the ball long enough to get some points. They finished half at 12-3 with just a penalty from Grindal to show for some good work.
In the second half with the slope, Southam were a lot more dominant and mostly contained Manor Park in their own half, they attacked the Park line with two good 50m runs from winger Sam Bench who was stopped just before the line on both occasions. Southam then hammered the Manor Park line for multiple phases and from a penalty, a quick tap by scrum half Jay Etherington was fed wide to allow full back Russ King to score in the corner. Southam were unlucky not to cross the line on two further occasions, but snuck the win with another quick tap from Etherington, which was fed across to three forwards, who with some slick handling from props Catterall and Will Bostock, fed Kimberly to score in the corner. Southam held out for the closing five minutes to win 12-13. A good win for Southam sees them straight onto the Warks Shield semi-finals and sets them up for the start of the league next week.

MOTM - Sam Bennet
DOD - Pete Burnell

Next weeks game Southam v Dunlop KO 3pm Mids 3 West (South)