Cotham Park RFC The closest Rugby club to Clifton in Bristol

After the 1sts game against St Brendans Old Boys was called off, the 2nds found themselves with such a plethora of players that Shoppo had to have a bit of "me" time to figure out what his starting line-up would be! After a few minutes alone, he decided to stick with his winning formula of geriatrics and young pups.

After winning the same fixture last year 72 points, Park were confident of victory. It appeared that Aretians had decided to give last years team a chance to atone for that crushing defeat. The front had a cumulative age of 150 years and the scrum half had been an extra in Dad's Army! As anyone with experience of playing in the Vet's match knows, rugby skill is like a fine wine, it improves with age.

The match kicked off, with Park, playing with the wind and down the slope. Early exchanges, and complete dominance in the scrum, saw Park camped on the opposition 5m line. To be honest, I can't really remember some of the tries or the order that they cam in so here's a run down....

Des push over from 2 yards.
Great backs move from a 5m scrum on the right for winger Jim to score in the left corner.
Same again with Jim again scoring in the left corner.
Another try...

Half time came and went. The second half kicked off. Aging prop cum kick boxer Des French athletically plucked the ball out of the air and charged back at the fly half. Amazingly, Des didn't choose to pass, and let the move flow, but decided to take the contact. Fortunately the fly half had planned for this eventuality and jumped out of the way. Another couple of hand offs and week tackles, and Des was clean through the opposition defence with the try line at his mercy. Having the tryline at his mercy is not uncommon for Des, however, having it at his mercy and it being 40 metres away must have been a bit unsettling. He decided to make a run for it. 40 metres became 30, 30 became 20 20 became 10... but wait. He was being caught. The wingers were catching him up. Surely he'd make it to the line though... 10 became 5, 5 became 2. 2 metres, Des' comfort zone. CRUNCH! The tackle arrives from both wingers simultaneously. Des unable to hand-off both sides at once, is forced to take the tackle. The support, expecting Des to make it, was still 50 yards away, now laughing as Des concedes the penalty for holding on.

The game continues, with Park scoring another two tries through Jim. Overall a good performance with strong displays from Alain in second row, Jim on the wing, Simon Freeguard with 2 conversions, and a number of the golden oldies.

I was expecting the day to get worse with the England Australia match but as we now know it just got better and better. Jokes about New Zealand bottling it again will only result in a beasting on Tuesday. It's probably worth it though...

The 1sts are playing BAC away a mystery team (phone Stringer - 07962235878 for more details) with the seconds playing BAC 2nds at home. Both games are likely to be very close so lets have a good turnout at training and don't forget to let Moley(07787 170265) and Shoppo(07971608520) know your availability.