Under 13 Match Report
SUNDAY 30th March 2008
Hinckley 0pts v Lutterworth 12pts
It was with some relief that we were able to secure a last minute fixture against Hinckley following a three-week break from playing due to weather and holiday commitments. With the County Cup final looming on the horizon it was essential that the boys started playing again and we are all very grateful to Hinckley for stepping in to fulfil this gap in our fixture calendar following the withdrawal by Ashby.
As we are still deep in the Easter holidays however we did struggle to put together 15 fit players especially in view of recent injuries to both tight head props (Jordan Laken with a broken collar bone in training and Lawrence Stevenson with a broken arm skiing). With a sickness bug claiming George Turner and Callum McDonald on the morning of the match we arrived at Hinckley with only 14 fit players. A plea was immediately sent to the under 12’s training in Lutterworth for some forward cover and although we were grateful to Hinckley for loaning a player to us for the first 10 minutes of the first half Ben Webb duly arrived and proceeded to have a cracking game filling in at number 8 with some crunching tackles on the much larger Hinckley forwards.
As anticipated this was another close game both sides playing their own brand of rugby with Hinckley playing to their forward strength and Lutterworth looking to move the ball around the backs. The scrummaging was relatively even but Lutterworth through a combination of Ben Gledhill, Matt Ringrose and Ollie Allen were totally dominant in the line out with good ball being taken from most of our own throws and Hinckley finding it very difficult to take any sort of ball from their own line out. The only try in the first half was scored by George Ball picking his way through a number of Hinckley tacklers following a neat move out through hands. James Gamble duly converted from under the posts. George Ball was also called upon in a defensive capacity to twice thwart Hinckley’s very pacey outside centre when on each occasion he looked favourite to score in the corner. Halftime score Hinckley 0 Lutterworth 7
The second half was surprisingly less open than the first. Lutterworth increased their lead following intense pressure on and around the Hinckley 5 metre line when Ollie Allen peeled off the ruck to score in the corner and despite a great effort from James Gamble the conversion fell just short. Again Hinckley had opportunities to score themselves with only a combination of desperate defending from Lutterworth and poor handling from Hinckley leading to a knock on at the 5 metre line rather than a try. All in all it was an extremely useful work out for those of the boys who were available to play and sets everyone up well for the tour followed by the County Cup Final.