Muddy but Enjoyable win for Stafford u15's

Stafford u15s made the short trip to Eccleshall to play the Eccelshall and Longton Barbarians. It was a mostly dry but blustery morning however, the pitch was very boggy in places due to the amount of rain during February.

Playing with the wind and down the slope in the first half Stafford made a fast start and they should have scored within the first minute but knocked on just before the try line. From the resulting Barbarians scrum Stafford struck against the head and Dan Poultney dived over from number 8 to open the scoring. Billy Jones added the conversion from out wide. Stafford continued to apply the pressure but were determined to play most of the rugby in the boggiest part of the pitch which resulted in numerous handling errors and forward passes. When they eventually moved away from the mud Colton McLaughlin was able to score Staffords next try from short range in the far right hand corner. As the first half drew to a close with the barbarians struggling to get out of their own half in the difficult conditions George Bowen burst over from a ruck close to the opposition try line to score his first ever try, something that was celebrated by the whole team. Max Jones added the conversion which saw the first half end with a score line of 0 – 19 to Stafford.

Playing against the wind in the second half Stafford knew they would be under a lot more pressure than in the first half and so it proved. Stafford were not really able to clear their lines by kicking from deep and were therefore looking to run the ball from all over the pitch. Midway through the first half, from one of the Barbarian clearing kicks, Stafford looked to run the ball from just outside of their 22. For once the Stafford backrow forwards passed the ball down the line after breaking the gain line, this saw Dan Poultney receiving the ball out wide and he was able to gallop 40 meters before passing to Max Jones on his outside who finished the move in the left hand corner. The try of the match if not of the season so far. The Stafford defense was very good but the Barbarians finally scored a try of their own late on to complete the scoring and leaving the final score at 5 – 24 to Stafford.

It was a fine team performance from Stafford in what turned out to be difficult and muddy conditions. But the handling was good when not playing in the boggy part of the pitch and the defense again was excellent. All the lads were pleased with the way they played as were the coaches. Keep it up boys and hopefully we will have some good games as well as a lot of fun on tour next weekend

Mark