Bridge scrape 8-3 win on road at West London

Uxbridge returned to league action having bowed out of the cup last week, to face a West London side who we are used to playing and is usually a physical, tight encounter.

Having experienced the full spectrum of weather in the warm up (wind, sun, hail, rain) Bridge received the kick and immediately found themselves under pressure in the boggy, heavy ground.

West London were making yards through some strong carries and good tackling from Simon Coldwell, Kyle Buckingham and Joe Elwig kept them at bay.

After this early scare, Bridge managed to get the ball in their hands and make some inroads into the West London defence. Good carries from Isaac Williams, Mark Coles, Matt Coker, Buckingham and Coldwell got West London on the back foot, with Bridge unable to turn into points.
The first points of the day came when Bridge earned a penalty on the 22 and kick-for the day Tom Rainey fly-hacked the ball through the posts to open the account. Pressure continued on the home sides line for the rest of the half, Coker was denied a try at the base of the post with the sodden melee that ensued.

Bridge came out in the second half with Adriano Martins and Jonno Was entering the fray. Now faced with the wind in their faces, Bridge opted to keep the ball in hand.

Strong carries from Jamie Woodstock and a jinking run from the finest ginger fly-half the sport of rugby union has ever seen, Joe Elwig (rumour has it he taught Neil Jenkins everything he knows) created half-opportunities, but the real joy was coming in the scrum.
West London were clearly tiring, giving Bridge the upper hand, and having scored a penalty of their own, Bridge had several scrums in the West London red-zone. One was collapsed and not given as a penalty try before a carbon copy scrum came and Buckingham peeled off the back to score.

Three minutes later, the game was bought to an end as a penalty kick went into the end zone and Bridge secured the win 8-3. A good result in touch conditions.

Bridge return to action on Wednesday 11 March in the Floodlit Cup against Ruislip, away to Harrow RFC (Kick-off- TBC), all players are asked to make themselves available.