Feltham 3s v Barnes Vets

…..and the night before as the sun set, Polish workers downed their tools, City high flyers declined the regular after work drinks and Welsh men from the valleys put their sheep down, (mind you they both work in the City and have nothing to do with farming!!!) to prepare for the gathering of the first Vets 12/13 fixture.

On Saturday the weather was near perfect with a clear sky and admittedly as we approached Feltham we had expected the tell-tale signs of thick black tire smoke from the previous nights social unrest to guide us to the Club, but as it happened we didn’t need to ask for directions from the latest Nike & adidas hoody clad youngsters and instead our sat-nav’s safely directed us to the Club house!

And what a pleasant surprise!!

I was reliably informed by one of the Feltham chaps that…….
‘……yeah there was a bit of a car accident and the whole ‘ting’ wen up in flames, ……so the insurance paid out and we got a new Club House!’

And certainly a club house to be marvelled at as well as sumptuous new changing rooms smelling of fresh paint………clearly a few ‘bright sparks’ at this club, I thought!!

So the starting side changed slightly with Duncan attending to his children and Chis Pini having gone on walk about!!!

1. Jerry Gillespie
2. Marty Sutherland
3. Rich Fenech
4. Brucie
5. Rob Allen
6. Jonny Spears
7. Tom Berry
8. Gundog

9. Nick Bellis
10. Marek
11. Si Curran
12. Nick Morgans
13. Russ Barnes
14. Dave Kassler
15. Jose

16. Duncan Maclver

The first 20 minutes saw us take to an enthusiastic and perhaps vulnerable lead and we sat back on our laurels subsequently allowing a much younger Feltham side the opportunity to score a couple of times.
We took some time to settle our set piece and Feltham consistently dominated in the lineout, but soon parity in the scrum prevailed and our back row worked well together.

Where we let ourselves down, was to consistently not contest aggressively enough at the ruck and slipped off some tackles.
Feltham started to exert their younger fitness over us and I understand the game acted as a good platform for one or two of their rested first team players to try out skills where indeed there was a good interlink by their backline.

In the later part of the game Feltham’s younger players antagonised us with antics that the referee struggled to assert authority over and we rather stupidly succumb to a war of words which left us off guard and Feltham scored again!

For a first game of the season there is much we did well and a handful of basics to quickly improve upon, which I am sure will have us back to winning ways.

Notable mention must go to try score’s Jose (2), Dave Kassler (1), and Tom Berry (1), with Merek scoring three conversions.

Feltham were most hospitable and invited us to join in a quick boat race nominating ‘dick of the day’ and ‘man of the match’…..as Duncan had already left to attend to parental chores, Gundog comfortably accepted the dick of the day accolade and whilst Tom Berry was a worthy nominee for man of the match (his lovely wife Helen was due to give birth to their first child, so in true Tommy Guns style he felt it would irresponsible to drink more than two pints when he might have to race around the M25 to a Surrey hospital!!!), but Russ Barnes, who is no stranger to drinking alcohol in huge quantities stepped up to the plate!

Gundog and Russ demonstrated that bulging biceps adorned in tattoos was still no sure way of downing a pint and quickly saw off their younger opponents. Though off course we welcome the opportunity to repay Feltham their hospitality with a return fixture at Barn Elms!

We gracefully left and look forward to the next meeting of minds and skills as we travel down the M40 to take on Chinnor next Saturday!

Feltham 3’s 38 – Barnes Vets 26

Finch/Skips!
PS… my head was in most scrums or the bottom of the ruck so it’s a sketchy match report!!