Kesteven V West Bridgford

06/09/2014 Kesteven 1st XV v West Bridgford 1st XV

A bright but cloudy day greeted a first team squad down on numbers for the final pre-season warm up game. With a mixture of injuries, Weddings, holidays and a 2nd team league match, the 1st XV squad was down to only 15 players, with Des Friel bolstering the bench. Not ideal preparation when taking on a strong West Bridgford team that swapped places with Kesteven in the league structure following their promotion to Mids 2 East.

After a strong start from Bridgford with some good early drives, Kesteven had a Lineout on the 10m line. Kieran Taylor asked for the ball to be spun out wide early on first phase fancying that he could get the better of his opposite number. His confidence was well founded as he easily rounded his winger with a strong hand off before repeating the trick with the full back to touch down in the corner for an impressive opening score on the 5 minute mark. Unfortunately Chris Galloway, playing at scrum half, couldn’t quite convert (5-0)
A tight 25 minutes then ensued with both teams showing good glimpses, clean breaks and strong support running. On 33 mins West Bridgford scored their opening try through a great line from the 12 cutting our centres in two. As it was under the posts it was easily converted. (5-7).

Within three minutes West Bridgford backed their first try up with a smartly taken second, again easily converted. (5-14).
The 15 men of kesteven (including a second row and centre on the back row) did not at this point roll over. They showed that every time they got the ball they would be dangerous. It indeed turned out to be this way shortly before the half time whistle, when Harry Martin got on the end of a neat offload to touch down. Galloway converted smartly from near the touchline (12-14).

HT

The second half started with K’s supporting a few injured and tired bodies that could not find any rest due to the lack of subs. However Kesteven did use their one available player in Des Friel to jump on the back row in place of Harry Martin. Taylor’s impressive first half continued strongly into the second half, the Kesteven wing appeared to be able to beat his opponents at will through a mixture of pace, power and a strong handoff. On the back of an excellent Turner thrust, followed by a strong run from Tweddle, Taylor beat at least four men to score his second of the day. Sadly the usually dead eye Galloway could not convert. ( 17-14).

Almost immediately after strong Kesteven pressure led to them being camped on the West Bridgford line. Turner ran a neat line off Galloway to make the score 22-14. A narrow miss from Galloway left the score untouched by the conversion attempt.
By this stage West Bridgford started to make use of their large squad and made a few strong replacements. Their substitute flanker finding a few gaps in weak Kestevene tackling to make the score 22-19. The conversion was successful making the score 22-21.
A back and forth second half carried on in the same manner throughout. Whittaker made some strong thrusts that led to him taking a try out wide on the 53 minute mark. Again unconverted, (27-21)

West Bridgford were not done though. Kesteven’s tired legs started to show at this point. WB broke away to make the score 27-26.
Kesteven pressured Bridgford into a few mistakes leading to a penalty under the sticks that Galloway knocked over (30-26).
Kesteven’s 16 man squad's effort finally fell at the last hurdle with West Bridgford’s dangerous 15 and 12 linking to conjure three tries in the final four minutes. The final score was 30-43.

A good run out for the team that Kesteven put on the park, with 12 first team players unavailable, most of which that will come back into contention for the first league game next week. The coach, Mark Sayle was pleased with that fact that Kesteven’s structure and patterns were evident no matter which players were on the pitch. A test of the squads depth that went on the show that competition for places will be fierce this season.

Odams, Sheardown, Purvis, Tweddle, Pert, Cowley, Martin, Turner, Galloway, Wood, Taylor, Dingley, Lidstone, Draper, Whittaker.

Friel.