After the heartache of losing to TJ’s in the last minute of the game the previous week, it was important for Barnes Men’s 1st XV to get back on the horse and they did that fairly comfortably against Westcombe Park winning 34-12, whilst the Raiders, our Men’s 2nd XV, held on in a cliff hanger against Esher Cardinals to win 31-28.

Completing the card on Saturday, the Occies overwhelmed London Media 52-7 whilst on Sunday, our Colts were involved in a close encounter against Haslemere, it was neck and neck until near the end when we pulled clear to win 31-19.

All of the match reports are below and also separately on the front page of the website, where you can also find a super Minis and Juniors update from Boris Pomroy.

This weekend it is a full house of Barnow adult fixtures, with all 6 adult teams in action, kicking off with the Originals under lights at Wimbledon on Friday night.

On Saturday, the Men’s 1st XV and 2nd XV travel to Old Albanians and on Sunday both Women’s teams are at home, the 1st XV take on Hackney and the 2nd XV take on Aylesbury.

With only the Women at home on Sunday you have absolutely no excuse not to be down supporting our wonderful warriors, and they absolutely love it when you do!

Back to the Men's 1st XV game, OA’s have had a tough season on and off the pitch. On the pitch they have lost their last 4 games to Guernsey, Havant, Canterbury and last week to TJ’s and they are in 9th position in National League 2 East with 4 wins as opposed to Barnes being in 4th position with 7 wins.

However, we have learnt the hard way over the years that current league position and recent results can be irrelevant in the outcome of a game, and we will need to be wary of tripping up on an OA’s banana skin on Saturday at Woollams.

I mentioned that OAs have had a tough time off the pitch recently, and that is because one club legend Peter Lispcomb passed away last week after being part of the club for over 40 years. A stalwart of the OA’s committee and a supreme volunteer, Peter had always greeted us with a friendly smile and was a key part of why people like OAs so much. Peter, you will be sadly missed at Barnes by all who knew you, and we will remember you well on Saturday.

Friday 22nd November Fixture
• Wimbledon Vets vs Barnes Originals - 7.45 pm KO
Saturday 23rd November
• Old Albanians 1st XV vs Barnes Men’s 1st XV - 3pm KO
• Old Albanians 2nd XV vs Barnes 2nd XV - 2pm KO
• Lightwater vs Barnes Occies - 2pm KO
Sunday 23rd November Fixtures
• Barnes Women 1st XV vs Hackney Ladies 1st XV - 2pm KO
• Barnes Women 2nd XV vs Aylesbury Women - 2pm KO

Barnes Colts 31-9 Haslemere Colts - words by Coach Andy Donovan
Barnes Colts produced an outstanding performance to beat a strong Haslemere Colts team 31-19 in the Surrey Cup on 17th November at Barn Elms.

The game fizzed from start to end and could have gone either way until the last few minutes.

Haslemere were bigger up front and had 3 or 4 powerful ball carriers.

The Barnes defence was stout throughout. Our superior pace and ball handling eventually paid dividends.

Our 4th try in particular was sublime, the ball going through 10 or 12 pairs of hands with some terrific close inter-passing. Great credit to both teams for a superb match.

Barnes Occies 57-5 London Media - words by Captain Jamie Bass
The Occies ran out strong winners against London Media on Saturday. Despite a few setbacks before the game in the form of missing shorts and a lack of rugby ball, there was an impressive energy and commitment from the off against a competitive London Media side. It was a dominant Occies display throughout with the standout moment being a cross field kick assist from winger Kurt Won. Final score 52-7.

Barnes Men’s 1st XV 34-12 Westcombe Park 1st XV - words by Rich Fenech

Barnes composed, not compelling.

Barnes needed this win and justly earnt it!

A spirited Westcombe Park forced early penalties of Barnes who found themselves defending purposefully on our try line. Park couldn’t convert that early attacking phase into points and instead the home side found their composure, putting together a dominant attacking phase with Jacques Birch collecting a brilliant grubber kick going over in the corner for the first try of the match with McDermott converting.

A passage of scrappy play with slovenly mistakes by both sides finally ended at 20 minutes with a well worked catch and drive coming from new lock Arinze Okemo collecting brilliantly, setting up Birch to go over the same corner for another try, but not converted.

The visitors had patchy phases of scrum dominance frustrating the Barnes pack who eventually fixed the problem, setting up a perfect break for Oliver Walker to gather a clever pop ball and punch through to score under the post with McDermot collecting the extra 2.

At 19-0 Barnes complacency crept in having had enough warnings for high tackles, gifting Park an easy attacking scrum and their first try of the match by Roofe with Wyman scoring the conversion.

The second half started with the same discipline issues seeing yellow go to Park No5 for high tackles. Subsequent back chat had Park concede 20m allowing Barnes to inflict another excellent line out setting up a dominant catch and drive maul with Josh Archer taking the spoils and McDermott converting.

Despite what appears an ascendancy to the home team Park muscle their way back in and a lethargic defence lets in a soft try scored by Kiri and converted by Wyman.

To make amends Park concede more pens and Barns flex their muscle in both the lineout and scrum. Dominant mauling sets Birch up for his 3rd try of the game as he cleverly contorts out of the tackle reaching for the line, McDermott takes the two points.

The referee’s consistency in officiating the high tackle saw Barnes No5 see yellow igniting a resurgent Park, kudos to a composed Barnes who kept an increasingly confident Park out. And yet more discipline let Park down with Birch scoring his 4th in the final minutes, but not converted.

Barnes composure won the day but still in 4th gear with much more to give.

Barnes Men’s 2nd XV The Raiders 31- 28 Esher Cardinals - words by Dom Palacio

A proverbial game of two halves!

After the painful narrow defeat to Richmond last weekend, The Raiders were highly motivated to react positively, with a home league fixture verses another local rival Esher’s 2nd XV - The Cardinals.

The away fixture at the beginning of the season, saw us defeated by 2 scores, so there was added motivation to attempt to pick up the win!

The Cardinals squad, looked strong, with 2 ex-Barnes 1st XV players Alex McClean and Jack Blackmore in their squad, as well as a host of others with National League 1 experience.

We “hit the ground running” after a focused and intense warm up, with Cam MacDonald starting at 9 and Archie Heard at 10, our speed at the breakdown was intense and having 3 excellent ball carriers in our forward pack, we took territory, time and time again.

Winger Finn Matthews scored twice in the first 10 minutes, with our scrum dominant, giving us further “front foot” ball.

Raiders scored two more tries in the first half, with little response from The Cardinals. Hooker James McCarthy scored just after the 20-minute mark. We then scored once more, with the referee awarding a penalty try just 5 minutes later.

Esher rallied, our intensity dropped, having scored 4 tries in 25 minutes and the tables then turned.

The Cardinals grabbed the momentum and scored twice before the end of half, and at the break we led 26-14 and it was game on!

We started the second half with more focus and control. 7 minutes into the second half winger Henry Pharaony scored our last try of the day, extending our lead to 31 - 14.

The Cardinals were unfazed, despite the score line and losing 2 front row players to injury.

As a result, scrums went uncontested, which removed our attacking platform produced by our dominant pack.

The Cardinals dominated the remainder of the game and, with the Raiders, now fatigued and losing focus, anxiety crept in effecting our confidence to finish the job.

With 15 minutes left to play the score was 31-28!

Raiders Captain - Ryan Nixon, who had led from the front all afternoon, instilled belief into the other 14 men wearing our the red rose of Barnes, that we were NOT going to lose the game having worked so hard in the first half to build us a great platform to take victory.

We defended attack after attack and managed to hang onto the lead, helped by a couple slices of luck!)

At full time we were still in front and duly won 31-28.

Our man of the match was skipper Ryan Nixon, a outstanding Captain's performance for 80 minutes