Cinderford U15’s 22 Croesiliog U15’s 7
Cinderford kicked off and the ball was taken in by the Croesiliog forwards, a quickly recycled play landed the ball in the hands of the crossy backs, some quick hands and fantastic turn of pace ended up with a breakaway try under the posts, conversion added and 7 points down within the first 2 mins.
From the restart Crossy could not take the ball cleanly and knocked forward. First scrum down of the game on the 22, Cinderford were surrendering some weight in the Front row with Crossy fielding some very powerful players, however a good clean scrum resulted in the ball finding its way into Wilfs hands, with good vision he made a short break and off loaded a pass to George M who had a run a great line, he powered his way through to touch down for the try. Toby added the conversion . From the resulting kick off Cinderford gathered the ball however some great work by the Crossy forwards at the breakdown saw the ball on the side of the Welsh team, another good press by their backs with some great passing ended in a knock on.
Play was to and fro for the next 20 mins with the majority of the game played between both 22 metre lines. Cinderford were having to defend more than attack with the Crossy forwards winning a lot of ball at the breakdown. 25 mins in and the game delicately poised Louie sustained a broken collar bone, this leaving the bare 15, with no subs available. Cinderford rallied well and showed their character, after 30 mins with a quick ball from breakdown near the halfway line a deft pass found the capable hands of the speedster Will ‘Bambi’ Duberley who crossed the whitewash.
From the start of the second half Cinderford were dominant. 10 mins in and after some good work at the breakdown and lovely off loading from the Cinderford forwards Russell used all of his strength to power his way to cross the line. Toby was unlucky with his conversion effort. Much the same as the first half the following 20 mins were played between the 22’s, Crossy always looked threatening with the ball in hand and again some handling errors from them coupled with some good defending from Cinderford kept the line uncrossed.
At 17-7 the game was far from over and could easily have swung back towards the Welsh team. If it wasn’t for the tenaciousness of the Dockham Road boys the game could have ended differently. Play remained tight for the final 10 mins and it wasn’t until Will A showed his pace and power to run in the final score from the halfway line that Cinderford could breathe a sigh of relief.