Old Bedians 5 - 13 Bolton

Searching for their first win of the season, Old Bedians narrowly lost out 13-5 to a much improved Bolton side at Millgate Lane. Bedes started off on the front foot with the forwards enjoying being camped in their opponent’s 22 for much of the first quarter. The home side were dealt a blow when they lost winger Elton Lurch to a rib injury, this caused a reshuffle which meant that Chris Hetherington had to move from flanker to the unfamiliar position of left wing, to his credit he responded with a solid game and some memorable defencive hits. Bedes kept rolling forwards, pushed in the right direction by the tactical kicking of captain Gaz Prytherch and strong running from, most notably, Dave Sully and Ollie Keck meant that Bolton’s defence had to be at it’s best to keep the home side at bay. Unfortunately for Bedians they failed to turn the pressure into points with a Mike Gallagher penalty striking the upright and dropping agonisingly the wrong side of the cross bar. Bolton got themselves back into the game and just before half-time were rewarded for their efforts by converting a simple penalty from in front of the posts. After an even first half the score was 0-3 to the visitors.
The second half began at a frantic pace with Bolton throwing everything they had at Bedians, all of which, at least initially, was thwarted by the solid midfield defence of Jude, Prytherch, Sully and Roberts. Bedians then went on the attack and from a scrum close to the Bolton line scrum-half Mark Howard darted blind and released winger Rick Snape to crash over expertly in the corner, with the conversion drifting inches wide the score was 5-3 in Bedians favour. Bolton fought straight back and soon found themselves edging ahead in the battle up front, providing their speedy backline with a lot of good ball. After defending their line manfully for over five minutes, Bedians cracked and gave away a penalty which was again converted by the visitors, 5-6. As Bedians threw caution to the wind in search of the match winning score they turned over possession and for the first time all game their first up defence was breached by Bolton’s inside centre who scored under the posts, the try was converted and with only 2 minutes remaining it was over bar the shouting for the plucky Bedians.
Old Bedians must now re-group ahead of a tough away trip to Littleborough next Saturday, if they could match the passion and honesty of this performance with some better decision making under pressure then the first win of the season is surely imminent.