This defeat relegates us to third in the league and mathematically out of the Title Race. Oh dear! Once again we showed that we are not the sum of our parts, we have some good individual talent but as a team we really struggled.

After the first ten minutes you would have been forgiven for thinking the final score line would definitely be in our favour. Henry made a great break, Pup almost got clear but lost the ball in contact and Bobby slipped up off the back of an attacking 5 meter scrum. Our only reward was a Pup penalty.

We actually put together some of the stuff we had worked on in training and didn’t over commit to the rucks and had pods running off the half backs. Our lineout spluttered but our scrum was fantastic, what we really lacked was that final pass and an ability to release our speedy backs in space.

Midway through the half Gades got some territory but we managed to clear our lines, no thanks to Henry. Henry doesn’t often appear on the BM’s radar so I was particularly pleased to witness his pathetic kick. He at least turned to his teammates and immediately said “I’ll bring my case to training”.
Correct.

Tank made a battling forty yard diagonal run but not for the first time an opportunity went begging with a botched pass, it was frustrating but we were still on top in terms of territory and possession. As we entered the last 10 minutes of the half a poor clearance kick was gathered by the Gades scrum half, Healy. He evaded our one chaser and then set off into open territory, he linked with his support and we found ourselves out flanked down our left wing and their centre and Captain cantered in for a pretty soft try.

Renegades then gathered some momentum and forced us into defense with some strong running from Jack’s Rookie. In fact Jack’s Rookie was probably Man of the Match and a constant thorn in our side.
Playing at inside centre he is a big unit who is also capable of offloading in the tackle and twice in the half we got lucky when his centre partner dropped his pass with the line at his mercy. The half ended with a Pup penalty and we went in at the break 6-5 up.

Andre came onto the wing and made an instant break up field, he found Jack who was then in a straight sprint for the corner with a Renegade Prop Forward. You know by the final score line who won the race.
Jack your case on Thursday please, the prop is deceptively fast and may even have had an angle on you but if there was any doubt that you would get caught you should have put a move on him to halt his progress……and besides I enjoy fining you.

We continued to press forward but a stray (cheating) boot stopped a free kick move after Dunlop had set it up. The ref apologized for missing it but that didn’t stop the frustration as we started to give away penalties, firstly Nails, rightly so for stamping then T and then Church who can both feel a bit hard done to. Anyway the resulting 80 yard loss of territory ended with a lost lineout that was spun to Jack’s Rookie who ran through weak midfield defense to set up an easy run in for his centre partner. 12-5 down. Hendo, the Gades fly half, slotted a drop goal and with Jack’s Rookie finding a lot of holes the Gades suddenly started to stretch out a lead that we didn’t really look like clawing back.

Tank provided a rare second half highlight with a nice chip followed by a thunderous tackle but other than that the rugby was being played by the opposition and not us. Healy nicely gathered his own grubber and scored under the posts and then with a few minutes left their backrower scored out wide.

Our humiliation was not quite complete. Gades had thankfully finished scoring on us but that didn’t stop us from making life harder on ourselves. The final few minutes saw a flurry of substitutions and in the confusion Donal and Dunlop went off and Adam came on. Hopeful that we are that Adam will be good, I don’t think he is yet up to being as good as both of them put together. As our Captain and Vice took their seats on the bench next to each other in a depressed state the other 14 on the park played on. It was only when a scrum was awarded that the bright pair of Bobby and Nails realized we were
missing someone. We informed the bench who immediately substituted Devrae for Jahbari. A bit more scratching of heads went on before we came to the conclusion that we were still missing someone!

Donal eventually figured out that he had not been substituted at all and sheepishly rejoined the game. Boydie, you were running the bench so you are guilty but you cannot take full responsibility so you can share a case with Donal.

So a game that overall reflects our season. A great start that we never really built on followed by moments of good and really pretty bad rugby. Very disappointing considering the potential/experience in this side.

Still it’s not all over just yet. Police next followed by Mariners and then we can concentrate and go out and win the Nicol Shield which we haven’t done for a while.

All debtors please bring your beer on Thursday. The club is filling the fridge on Tuesday as we host a training session for the students of Mount St. Alison, it would be good to have numbers on Tuesday!

See you there.

BM