London French 19-24 Mayfair Occasionals

Mayfair Occasionals 24-19 London French

(See attached file: Occies.jpg)

It was the only game that really counted over the weekend: Occies vs London
French - "Le Crunch".

Spirits were high as we enjoyed our best away turnout of the season - it
seems the arduous 100 yard trek from Barnes RFC over the road to London
French wasn't going to be enough to deter these travelling Occies.

In light of it being the final six nations weekend, we were given an early
kick off. When we turned up at 11:30 conditions were far from perfect -
unless you really enjoy lots of rain, excessive mud and playing with a bar
of soap (shower preferences aside - Calvert). The front row must have been
particularly happy with this... if one thing was certain that day; there
was going to be more than one scrum and the Oppo front row looked lumpy to
say the least.

The warm up went well and it seemed clear that everyone had their game
heads on. Suki rallied the troops with a rousing pre-game talk, just about
managing to not insult our recent recruit of French origin Martin, with
cries for French blood.

When the game got underway, everyone stepped up. It was clearly going to be
an old school dirty game, and it seemed the team relished it.
We managed to put points on the board early doors after some text book
rucking and hammer balls, followed by simple drawing and passing through
the backs to send winger Timmy over the line. Within 5 minutes we were at
it again, this time with Chris powering through the last of the defence for
a second Occies try.

It looked as though it was going to be the massacre that Suki was baying
for, but this French side wasn't ready to capitulate just yet and answered
with two tries. One such try culminated with the FL player attempting to an
Ashton-esque swan dive only to be met mid-flight by the shoulder of our
resident falcon: Pagey. Although the ball was grounded and try stood, the
FL player will think twice next time he considers an excessive tryline
dive!

Over the course of the first half the forwards had a great presence on the
pitch; strong rucking, multiple hammer balls, strong line outs and a solid
scrum. Sharpie ran particularly well taking crash balls off Huw and scoring
2 tries - a nice touch for his penultimate game.

The backs handled themselves very well in challenging conditions. Simple
rugby done well was the order of the day.

The second half was spent camped out on the oppo's try line but we failed
to crossed it. Well... two players (Andy Day and Bevan) crossed it, chasing
down a delightfully passed kick but somehow physics defied them both and
neither was able to land on a bobbling ball.

The last ten minutes of the game the tables were turned on us and it was
our turn to show what we could do in defence. We put in a fantastic dogged
performance for a gruelling 10 mins until someone (me) decided that a
fluffed box kick to the oppo's unmarked winger was the preferred course of
action. A few minutes later and they were over the line, bringing the score
to 24-19 where it stood for the last five mins - a long five minutes of
great defence.

Well done to all involved - it was a great game to be a part of. Special
mention has to go to Andy Day and Duncan Wallace for playing after long
Occie sabbaticals. Particularly Duncan who slotted into the 2nd when he
normally plays 10!

Also a shout out to Jay for turning up unannounced from Toronto to watch
(and then taking his baby and better half along to the pub to watch the
England game). As Suki said in the warm up, really shows what the Occies
are about that people are prepared to do that, on an absolutely rubbish day
for conditions

And so to the regular slots....
Good:

· Dogged determination from all.
· Proving that there are players outside of the centre.... and that
they can score when given the ball.
· Great work in the line out (Bevan and Duncan), scrum solid under a
lot of pressure from a big French tight 5 (so thanks to CJ, Pagey, Oli and
the Hitman), good ball retention and Hammerball throughout.
· Backs showed great ambition and handled the ball well in tough
conditions.
· Great defence against a very solid LF outfit containing a number of
their 1s.
· OJ (supported by the team) managing to hold up the ball over our line
to prevent a try.
Their grizzly prop apologising to me after the game for
consistently hitting me late after every line out. Not sure if this is
good, bad or silly - it certainly didn't feel good, but I appreciate the
gamesmanship.

Bad
· The tries we conceded were a little soft.
· Our discipline was poor - we knew what we where getting with that
ref, but we got on the wrong side on him towards the end. We need to trust
our defence and not expect to turn over ball at every single ruck. It would
have been a scandal if our poor discipline had led to a loss.

Silly
· Both kits turning to brown making for some interesting decisions from
the ref.
· Calvert struggled with the same issue putting the boot in on our own
players in rucks.
· Match teas being held in a corridor as there was a toddler's birthday
party in their main hosting area.
· Sharpie being blown up for aggressively letting the team (and by
proxy the ref) know that the ball was being held up in a maul.
· The oppo living up to reputation by getting in a sneaky reach-around
on Duncan early doors.
· Martin getting a bit of sledging in French from an oppo, who was then
surprised to be told exactly what he could do to his own mother in French
in return!
· Htiman somehow coming off the pitch without any mud on his face - a
situation which Chris White remedied.
· Bev thinking the game would be cancelled due to rain.
· Some very flashy new changing rooms being turned into the Florida
swamps after the showers flooded.
Any dyslexic errors in the match report