Saturday 29th Oct. Ponteland 3s 36, Bricks 32

 

Westoe had to withdraw from the league game due to lack of numbers and we picked up a friendly away with Ponteland 3s and for the first time this season we went with a large squad, in fact 13 substitutions we made between first and second half, funny thing was, it could have been more subs, but for late cry offs.

Photos: thanks to Finnas again, we have a load of photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/26086313%40N08/collections/

Headlines:

• Scrum was dominant, both halfs
• Diver’s try was created when Joe M switched blind, ball through hands to create the overlap
• Ryan, Cliff, Strachs Snr, Harry, Joe M, Steve S and Tom made good yards with the ball
• We were totally dominant in first 15 mins, but seem to get a little over confident and we let Pont into the game, with them wining more ball. With more ball their backs showed a bit more pace than Bricks.
• Good to see Ryan and Richard play their first games of the season
• We lost the ball in contact too much with people going in isolated and being dis-possessed by a quicker Pont side who got more numbers there, oh! where oh! where was our openside…… Joe and Jake did a sterling job, with tackling and going forward, but we could have had more turnover ball against the lighter Pont players .
• Good to see James, the newly named 21 minute man, coming back from long term injury, who wanted to complete more minutes than Grumpy normally plays, one of our two 60+ers
• Jake had a very good debut in a Brick’s shirt
• Strachs Jnr. Did not look happy being lifted in the line out
• Ryan caused them issues all game with physical strength and improved mobility this season
• Lewis and Hopey kicking had an off day, 5 trys and one conversion
• Too many people questioning referees decisions, you’d think we’d learn, fair enough Pont were at him all the time and even swapped people doing the challenge, consciously, I was behind the post when they decided who’s turn it was next. Then even swapped the captain as he had pushed it too far, that was good thinking, sneaky, but intelligent.
• Not sure what Joe S and Damien A were doing, attempting a scissors in our 22 during the last play of the game, which resulted in them dropping it and staring at it on the ground as Pont. Picked it up and ran in for the winning score, hoof it Joe.

Scorers:
Trys; Joe M, Lewis, Divers, Ryan & Richard
Conv Lewis 1

It’s never easy to maintain the momentum when you make so many changes in a game, there were good displays all round the park and on a lovely day for rugby everyone played their part and put everything into it. The 4 Development players wanted some game time before the cup match next week and again people were slow to respond, so I had no idea we would have 13 subs when I agreed to let them join the squad and they all played well. No doubt we could have won if we had not made as many changes, but it was a friendly, everyone got game time and in two weeks time we could be back to 15 players, unless we play as a squad.
Next week’s sees a Vets tournament on Friday night and the rest of the team helping out the Development on the Saturday with a cup game at Seaton Carew. Week after12th Nov. we are away to Blyth IIs in the league.

1. Tom. (Brian Penny)
2. Craig McBurnie. (Keith winter)
3. Ryan (Tom)
4. Steve Sewell (James K)
5. Cliff. (Strachs Jnr)
6. Joe Melia. (Jake)
7. Ian Bennie (Richard Pike)
8. Strachs Snr. (Harry)
9. Hopey
10. Joe Snowdon . (Mick)
11. Damien S. (Paul Dingley)
12. Chester
13. Divers. (Damien A)
14. Micky Bell. (Steve)
15. Lewis Hill. (Joe Snowdon)