Park House FC

Archive

Firstly, thanks to Beccehamians, the ref and Greg for getting us a game. Beccs 3rd XV are a league below us and it was good of them to give us a game.

With three full teams out it was good to see so many familiar faces in the 2nds with a few extras thrown in for good measure. Unlike our usual profile with the super fast backs and mobile pack, today's game saw the fastest bloke on the pitch was 44 yrs old (that's right Frostie). Nevertheless from the off, the massive strength in the pack showed as we stole every other scrum from Beccs by sheer force. The front row was one of the most solid all season with a long awaited showing from Kev Mullins who had a very good game in the loose and from set pieces. This enabled the backs to run through every move in our arsenal with Russ performing superbly at 10 and the real devastation coming from the the centres, Gravesy and Frostie. Second phase ball was quick with great performance from the whole back row, who probably carried more ball forward than the rest of the team. One of our major strengths was having a second fly-half at full-back, Sweats. We continually receycled the ball and with next-to-no kicking, completely dominated the game. Unfortunately, Beccs never looked to threaten our line, but this was not through lack of effort. There were 9 tires and five conversions and I forget the exact order, but will mention a few that stuck in my mind.
1. Wills second minute try, alomst under the posts after some very good loose play by the forwards from the kick off.
2. Frostie's 1st. Russ had been controlling the game very well at 10 and after several phases threw a miss pass out to Frostie, who cut a perfect line, knocked over a prop and crossed the line (to break his drought!).
3. Sweatie's. We had been continually attacking from open to blind and as such created huge gaps across the pitch. This one involved a long pass from Russ on one side of the pitch to Andy, who took it forward towards the other side, off-loaded to Alex who strode towards the line with Sweatie in close support, offloading just as he took the hit, for Sweatie to score. (Sweatie kicked 5/8 of his kicks - which is better than Charlie Hodgson!).
4. Will's other 3 tries. All rubbish, pure fluke, no skill, no power!
5. The other people to score were Frostie again, Harry Monk, and Gravsie after a bshing run through 3 or 4 players.

A very good game had by all and most enjoyable. We set a rule with about half and hour to go - no kicking. And it worked! The best example was from a scrum on our own 5 metre line, between the posts. Andy broke to the right (roadside) and Russ followed from the left to join the line. Andy drew the fly half, offloaded to Russ, who drew the centre, offloaded to Frostie, who drew the wing, offloaded to Shaggy, who ran the legngth of the pitch, to the opposition 22 (i know, he did a little chip along the way, but that's not really kicking, is it?). Anyway, they picked up his chip but with him following it up so closely, they were left with no option but to scramble it into touch. PH Lineout. Now, how far would a kick have got us (our own 22 maybe?) and even then it would have been their lineout. Be confident, run with the ball (I think Gazza sang a song about that).

The team was:

1. Jinxie.
2. Bob Meager.
3. Kev Mullins.
4. Big John.
5. Big Paul.
6. Harry Monk. 1 try.
7. Will Madine. 4 tries and two jugs.
8. Alex Phillips.
9. Andy Millar.
10. Russ Turner.
11. Jim Donovan.
12. Gravsie. 1 try.
13. Peter Frost. 2 trys.
14. Shaggy.
15. Neil MacCallum. 1 try, 5 conversions.
16. Moley.