Brentwood U16s 10 Upminster U16s 7

Brentwood trudge to victory…

Having had 3 weeks with no match there was speculation on the touchline that this match would probably go one of two ways; astonishingly well as the boys would be extremely up for it or dismally badly as the boys would have forgotten how to play. As you can probably guess on a cold, damp morning when everyone would still rather have been under their duvets they opted for the latter.

Brentwood ’s start, compared to their previous Golden Boot antics, was slow and laboured and they looked as if they were struggling to keep their eyes open let alone retain possession. Despite this they worked their way up the field and into the Upminster 22 where they remained for a period but with consistent knock on's and turn over's failed to score.

After losing territory and ending up back just inside the Upminster half the ball was once again turned over by Upminster and Brentwood’s defence, set for the attack, was in no way, shape or form organised. The Upminster backs set off and a large arcing movement stretched the scrambling defence with the result being a try run round under the posts. The conversion was on target, 7-0 to Upminster.

Following this Brentwood perked up a bit with some good periods of play but for the most part whilst the right ideas were definitely there the execution wasn’t, at times Brentwood looked like they couldn’t catch a cold (which in that weather would be an achievement). Deciding that perhaps chucking the ball around wasn’t working the forwards kept it tight for a while and eventually a maul was held up over the try line. From the following scrum Brentwood opted to pick and go and having been camped inches from the try line for what seemed like an eternity they finally managed to scramble over in the form of Matt Gray (I hope…I couldn’t see so am again relying on word of mouth but having been told off by Roland for awarding his try to someone else I’m covering myself if it’s wrong! Numbers on shirts would be so very helpful…). The conversion missed, 5-7 to Upminster.

Typically from the next restart Brentwood seemed to have gone up a gear with great carries from Ross Cant and Lewis but even more typically the half time whistle was blown.

As Ian worded it, most of the second half was diabolical. Lots of rucking, lots of turnovers, lots of scrums and just general crashing and bashing. However just as Ian’s hands were slowly creeping towards the hat on his head, the game sprang into life, albeit briefly. Rob made a break straight down the middle of the pitch, the look on his face when loads of space just opened up in front of him was a pure Kodak moment. Unfortunately it all fizzled out but at least the boys were in the right position on the field. More picking and going saw them held up over the line again and again and again but to no avail and it looked like they were just never going to score the try. This was followed by so many dropped balls, lost rucks etc that it looked like game over but then in the dieing moments a maul was got going and having made it ridiculously hard for themselves Rob got over the try line. The conversion again missed, 10-7 Brentwood and game over. Whilst not a great performance, still a win and as some clever person once said “Winning but not playing well is the sign of a good team.” Maybe but playing well would be much nicer…

Lastly, it distresses me to say that I think I’m losing my touch as I can’t think of one single thing to mock Billy for this week. Please, if you have any suggestions whatsoever (other than his face) let me know!