Saturday 4th March – Durham 4th Team Shield – Blaydon Bricks 79 v Chesterlee Street IIs 0
The score line didn’t do justice to how well Chester played on the day, Blaydon were just far more clinical in taking their opportunities and converting points and with a decent size squad available had a lot more fresh legs to introduce than Chester did, who ran out of steam in the second half.
The approach of dealing with this as any other game seemed to pay dividends, everyone (especially me) was a lot more relaxed, everyone knuckled down and played, advice to the referee was minimised, penalties were greatly reduced, even the comments from the sideline were somewhat positive and everyone went around their role in a professional manner.
Pictures, thanks to Finnas: https://www.flickr.com/photos/26086313%40N08/collections/
Scorers:
Trys: Stracks, Keith, Knoxy, Hopey, Rodders 3, Cliff, Liam, Matt, Divers, Brett
Conv: Rodders 8
Penalty: Rodders 1
Highs and Lows:
- Things started well, Drennon took it on, James in support, Tom continues, Divers dropped it… as it the pass, was it the catch… no one cared, the intent was shown
- Roles reversed Divers (backs) went through passed to Drennon dropped, but there was no arguments, we just went again till we got it right
- Rodders was kicking well out of hand from our 22, to theirs, off the tee was a little below his par but he got enough
- Hopey made a mazy run, confused all CLS and the Bricks, but it resulted in a good score.
- We had both the high kick Winters on the field, first to drop was Keith, right hash of it, out in the open…..
- By now our forwards were dominant in the scrum and in the lose, with runs from all, Tom, Keith W, Paul, Keith O, James, Stacks, Ian and Drennon, wave after wave and a lot of tackling practice for CSL.
- From such a forward play ball came to Divers, out to Rodders and Hopey’s second run he was just kept in at the corner by Rodders combining and Hopey touched down
- There was a pass and a catch, between Drennon and Keith, neither went well and ball spilt…
- Then it was Paul’s Winters turn, clear shout, kick off too long for CLS to get to it, Paul split it and took loads of stick about his T-Rex arms in the bar afterwards, in fact a T-rex outfit may have been sourced … it was too many Moretti’s in to know if the one click purchase had been pressed…
- Keith stole a ball, legally (possibly) and went blind, out to Rodders who ran it in
- Stracks breaks, to Hopey, kick down the line, ooooohhhh what were you doing Stu R, one not to try at home…. or away even.
- Good interchange Divers to Matt, back to Divers who released Liam to run in a good try.
- Brett ran a try in from around 40 metres bouncing off CLS players, he set off on a second run soon after was desperate for someone to pass to.
- Cliff tried to trot and talk, that didn’t end well, he did batter a few CLS players out the way
- Steve Palmer set off on a run, cavalry charge was sounded
- Cliff does a Paul Winter and messes up a high ball
- Windy taped up Cookie for the line out jumps and cut off the blood to his legs, sure he told him to run it off…..
- Good to see Craig Rowlands making a comeback and we didn’t break him this time
- CLS lose a prop and Grumpy nearly won one against the head in uncontested scrums
- One little strop was visible on the day, when a substitution was made… it’s great that people really want to play for the Bricks and don’t want to come off, but we were just trying to get everyone a game and involved
- Additional forwards try scorers were Stracks, Cliff and Keith W – all from half way as well, according to bar talk later in the evening.
- Backs ran in some more scores, with Matt, Divers and Rodders, who got up to his 3 scores (Jug owed to the lads)
- They was many more good interplays between forwards, backs/forwards and back but by now I was so happy we were going to win I put the book away and concentred on getting the Stella ready for the final whistle, which was consumed well, before retiring to the bar for many more beers, job well done.
Well played by all, good performances everywhere, sorry if i did not mentions a good or bad thing you did, message me and I can add things in, only factual things naturally…..
So we now have to wait for the 1st April for the Houghton 2s v Winlaton 2s game to see who we play in the final on 22nd April.
Team
- Paul Winter (Brett)
- Keith Winter (Grumpy)
- Tom Hirst.
- Keith Oliver. (Cliff)
- James Knox. (Steve Palmer)
- Ian Bennie (Darren Cook)
- Simon Drennon (Steve Sewell)
- Paul Strachan
- Stu Reay. (Liam)
- Phil Divers
- Liam Bradley (Mickey Bell)
- Steve Davidson. (Rob Pyle)
- Damien A (Matt Goodall)
- Hopey (Craig Barlow )