U7s vs Nailsea&Backwell

Match Report

Date:           22JAN12
Location:     North Bristol RFC
Teams :       U7s - North Bristol vs Nailsea&Backwell

Back at home this week to face Nailsea&Backwell for the first time. Both teams showed up in numbers that warranted running a second Under 7’s game in parallel. The scene was set in the winter sunshine with plenty of mud to go around.

On one pitch, there was some sensible running from North with ball in hand as we repeatedly found the corners when scoring. For their part, Nailsea gave as good as they got and kept the scoring even with their own runners and good passing. Worth specific mention is the skill that Louie B showed today for North both in his attacking running style and his awareness to quickly get back in defense to grab some tags. Also worth mentioning was Thomas C’s excellent change of direction mid-stride which sent everyone else on the field in the wrong direction! Both games on this pitch ended in a draw.

On the second pitch there were three really close fought games, with lots of tries from both teams. North put some nice passages of play together and were forced to turn possession over twice because we had been tagged 7 times and still had the ball in our possession!  There was some great passing and a great team effort with all the players helping each other out.  Edward C was running very strongly and determinedly at the opposition to great effect and scored two tries.  Otis W was running really well, as was James W.  Freddie E showed great determination and led the way in defence with his spirited and determined tagging.

While there were some very good individual efforts, as a team our tagging and handling could have been much better. We should be much quicker in grabbing tags from the reset. There were also numerous dropped passes and a lot of time spent running backwards. We were also slow in recovering the loose ball giving the advantage to the opposition on most occasions – all good fodder for the training ground next week!

All in all a great morning of rugby against worthy opponents wrapped up with a game of bulldogs (clearly some of you didn’t run around enough during the rugby!).