Cotham Park RFC The closest Rugby club to Clifton in Bristol

This is Bristol match report.

After a month without a league game thanks to the weather, Cotham returned to their promotion push with a game against the always battling Tredworth. The plan was to have an early kick-off so as to be finished in time for the England match, but as always Tredworth proved to be their usual useful selves and turned up late. This was dead handy because not only were Tredworth late but so was one of our starting 15; where was Pete “Thunderc**t” Ashby? Phone calls to both him and his girlfriend went unanswered and there was no sign of him. Even after Tredworth arrived he was nowhere to be seen, so in came Alev to the starting 15. Alev lined up in the pack alongside Andy Tamms and Pete Cowell, all gaining their first starts for the 1XV.

When the game finally began you could have excused Cotham of some ring rustiness, but this certainly wasn't the case as the first play of the game saw the backs sweep forward and score a try through centre Joe Laban. Up strode Ricky to take the conversion, his new boots still gleaming as he confidently placed the ball onto the tee, bang in front of the posts. The majority of us had assumed the conversion would have been a forgone conclusion, but Ricky had other ideas. As he struck the ball as clean as a Madrilenian whores’ undergarments the ball crept limply and unconvincingly over the corner of the crossbar for a 7 nil lead- just! With the slope and breeze at our backs we continued this early pressure and began to rack up the points. You could tell we were on top because even Ricky had the try line in his sights; he strode like a young John Regis towards the line, his head bobbing frantically as he ignored support and ran a ‘Stringer-esque’ diagonal line towards the white-wash. Thankfully the defence let the Welshman have his moment in the sun and he dived over the line for his first try of the season, a full 51 weeks since he last achieved a 5 pointer (how’s that for a stat!).

Despite some missed opportunities and lacklustre play in key areas, in truth, Tredworth never got into the game. The Cotham forwards dominated the set piece and starved their opposition of possession. The pressure was clearly telling on the Tredworth boys and some odd decision making came to the fore. This was typified by an awe-inspiring cross field kick from their scrum half; the ball soared majestically across the 22 where it was plucked out of the air by the winger. Sadly for Tredworth it was their own 22, the kicker had been stood on his own try line! And the winger was Julian; he caught the ball and ran in for another simple try. The first half ended and we were well in front, we’ll say 5 tries and some conversions to nil; but still no Pete Ashby??

We began the second half and fully expected the Tredworth 10 to use the conditions to his advantage and continue his kick-heavy game and pin us back, for some reason this didn’t happen. To their credit, they threw caution to the wind and started running the ball from everywhere. After some poor defence and more than a little help from the ref, by a little help I mean there was an impromptu training session on our 5m line, whereby he gave them 4 chances to run a tap penalty, they finally crossed the line to score. This indiscretion brought a break in play and a moment of silence from our team. Sadly this silence was broken by an all too familiar sentence being bellowed from the sideline.

“I’m sorry; I ended up having a few last night!”

You’ve guessed it, Pistol Pete had arrived, a full 2 and a half hours after the meet time! In his defence…..he had none, but he wasn’t hung-over just well rested. An annual dinner fine will definitely be issued do not worry!

Anyway, back to the game. Having conceded the score this spurred us on to go in search of more points, knowing how vital each one may be at the end of the season. Quite cleverly Tredworth realised we had increased our efforts and they moved their tenacious centre to full back in an attempt to bolster their drift defence. This paid dividends for them as on more than one occasion our backs had streaked through the first line of defence only to be felled by the Tredworth talisman. Eventually even he got overwhelmed by the continual pressure and the points began to flow again. Luke was rewarded for his excellent efforts both in this game and the season as a whole and finally grabbed his first try for the club, well first allowed try at least! Obviously I grabbed my token effort and having claimed tries in the first half, both Julian and Joe rounded off their hat-tricks. As much as it pains me to praise the ole moon-faced one, special note should go to Ricky Jones who despite the early wobble along with his try kicked 6 conversions to take his haul for the game to 17 points.

Well done lads on an all round good effort and well done to the boys who stepped up for their debuts. An altogether different prospect next week as we take on already promoted Kingswood in a vital home match, so make sure you are fully fit and available. Don’t forget we need full numbers at training on Tuesday night as we have a new coach coming up.

See you at training

Stringer

Tries:

Joe Laban (3)

Julian Hoefflin (3)

Rick Jones

Craig Coulstring

Luke Davies

Final score Cotham Park 57 - 7 Tredworth