A Sledge Hammer to Start…

With an eventful start to the day, despite the fact that Bannell and I actually met up in the morning to exchange keys for the lockup, our combined stupidity meant the keys still managed to end up on the ‘fun bus’ to Carnforth! One large sledgehammer, 20 minutes of hard graft and several cheers, after the lock was finally smashed to pieces, later we were able to start to prepare for the game. You could perhaps say that this would be a metaphor for the game to come but that would involve the pad lock somehow scoring four try’s against us (Mind you, It did have a hand in the 2nd try and kicked a conversion…)

Despite the final score this game was far from a walkover, Macc 4s, who finished 4th last year, are one of the strongest teams in the league and Bedians certainly didn’t back down from the challenge. Some good tackling and generally good defensive lines kept the score level at 0-0 until 30 minutes into the game. Bedians were finally undone by their number 8 exploiting probably the first real fractured defensive line to score just outside the posts despite a good effort to hold the ball up on the line.

7-0 quickly turned to 12-0 as Macc put another score on 5 minutes before the break. Then however, Bedians started to really play. Great work from the make-shift pack who carried and secured the ball well through several phases and drewn in the Macc defence. This allowed Bedians the perfect opportunity to ship the ball quickly from one side of the pitch to the other. Starting with, the returning, Ian “Man of Glass” Bett’s quick hands (yes, I said quick hands) getting the ball to Phil “Half Man/Half Tape” Parker, whose resulting pass missed out 2 players to find Mulholland at full pelt on the wing. Mully used his ‘considerable’ bulk to run straight through their full back to score in the corner. Great team try.

The introduction of Declan at half time really shored up the pack and after the break there was period of end to end stuff from both teams. This was broken on 60 minutes when their man of the match, that bloke with the floppy hair, received a pop on the 5 at full speed and smashed through to score under the posts.

With 5 minutes to go Macc wrapped it up and touched down under the posts again to secure the win. However this wasn’t the end for Bedians. Despite the score, we had played well and I knew every player on that pitch wanted one more score. And score we did, everyone dug deep and Bedians totally dominated the last 5 minutes. In the final play of the game a solid line out resulted in a big Bedians maul and scrum half Ben Rogerson letting it roll up a few metres before spinning it out at the perfect time, again through the quick hands of Ian “Did I Really play 80 Minutes?” Betts to Jay Lau. Jay for the first time ever ran in a completely straight line and left 2 tacklers for dead to run in and score Bedes 2nd try of the game. Great stuff Jay more straight lines please!

Man of the Match award goes to Ben Rogerson for finally giving in to the pressure to actually to play instead of just socialising, for landing the telling blow on the pad lock, oh and for actually having a pretty decent game!

Sledge Hammer warm ups will now be standard for the rest of the season.