Saturday 10th October 2009

Division 4 (East)

Glensburgh Park

GRANGEMOUTH STAGS 2ND XV 17 - 19 NORTH BERWICK RFC 2ND XV

Dream Team lose out in Nightmare Finale.

The Stags reserve squad was depleted by a bout of illness and a late call up to the 1st XV for Kenny Paterson who has been impressing of late.  On a glorious sunshine day at Glensburgh the stage was set for an entertaining game of rugby.

The locals lost Bell and Paterson to the 1st XV and McPherson who was unavailable leading to several changes although the return of Brendan Tucker, Mike Gowdy and Davie Wilson added some experience to the youthful squad with 10 u19’s in the squad although the bench had many years of experience.

North Berwick won the toss and elected to kick off and immediately their stronger and more experienced pack placed the locals under extreme pressure and allowed time for their speedy backs to attack. It was from one such attack that they shipped the ball wide allowing their winger a one on one where the tackle was missed and this led to a converted try.  Almost immediately, NB struck again with a series of driving runs by their forwards which led to their large 2nd row driving over from close range, the conversion hitting the uprights.

This was an almost identical start to last weeks match where it took 20mins for the young lads to step up to the challenge and how they did!  The tackles were being made and carrying of ball in hand was causing all sort of problems with Tucker and Gowdy making plenty of yards.  Unfortunately, all too often NB were able to slow the ball at the contact area or turn over ball due to their superior physicality.  That being said, they never entred the Stags 22 for the remainder of the half and the Dream Team squandered a number of good runs where poor decisions and passes led to breakdowns.

Half time and 12 nil down, Captain Pete Brough, having a fine game in the back row, encouraged his team to up the ante in the 2nd half and put some more pressure on NB. Within 5 mins of the re-start Crossan found himself warming the bench for 10 mins after some handbags at dawn, as did a NB player for killing the ball.

This seemed to settle both teams and the Stags set about clawing their way back into the match.  Firstly, from some excellent forward play Davie Wilson sent the ball out wide for Cammy Hunter to exploit a gap in the defence and score out wide with Brough just sqeezing the conversion wide.

It was then the turn of Brendan Tucker to cap off a fine display with one of his trademark bulldozing runs that led to a try near the posts with Crossan missing the extras before retiring with a swollen lung. Tucker was to be involved again, where from a scrum on the 22 he picked from No. 8, drew the defender before cleverly offloading to the supporting Davie Wilson who ran in for a top try. Callum Jaworek added the extras for a 5 point lead and 15 mins to go.

The stags then camped in NB’s half and bombarded them with relentless attacks and a combination of some tremendous defence by NB and a slight lack of composure meant the port side were unable to take advantage of their possession.  NB then took advantage of a splilled pass and sent a long kick up field and into the stags 22 where it was their turn to put on the pressure.  After some sustained attacks, ably defended, it was in injury time where the NB stand off sent a dummy scissors pass and sliced through a confused defence to score under the sticks and add the conversion for a 2 points win.

Overall, the coaches were disappointed at losing but delighted with the commitment off this young side who are improving week by week.  They played some continuity rugby and are improving their tactical awareness.  North Berwick for their part, played very well indeed and like the port side, threw the ball about and competed through the phases.

This was an excellent advert for 2nd XV rugby and a draw would have been a fair result but all credit to NB for sticking it out to the end to win the match.

Special mention to local man Ben Mallison who refereed the match to a high standard and we are grateful to him for doing so.  This week the Dream Team is on the road to play Edinburgh University 3rds with kick off at 3pm.