Shelford vs. Rochford U15, 30 January 2011

Rochford started the first period brightl,. pressuring Shelford, who defended well ,either pushing Rochford into touch or forcing them to concede penalties when tackled, giving Rochford plenty of practice at opposing line-outs. The deallock was eventually broken when a kick over the top by Shelford, was kicked towards touch by Niall Prior, chasing down his own kick, and picking it up cleanly, then surging forward. He passed to Ben Nock, when tackled, to complete the move, running through several Shelford tackles to score, with Josh Lipscombe converting Shelford 0 – Rochford 7. Rochford however did not hold the lead for long, Shelford working the ball away from a scrum, and exploiting the space left down one of the flanks Shelford 7 – Rochford 7. From the restart Shelford exploited the same route to increase the score Shelford 14 – Rochford 7, with Rochford mounting several attacks, but unable to level the score, before the end of the period.

With several Rochford changes the second period continued in much the same vein as the first, lots of Rochford unsuccessful attacks but this time Shelford making the most of their possession and a big lack of organisation in the Rochford ranks to score 5 tries, one converted, making the score Shelford 27 – Rochford 0. Rochford came close to scoring several times, Cameron Pitt winning the ball from a line-out, was stopped about a yard short of scoring, a Shelford player somehow emerging from the second ruck with the ball and counter attacking.
More player changes saw Rochford attempt to sort out the problems in the third quarter, bthey still managed to concede two early tries Shelford 10 – Rochford 0, before getting themselves in order. Sean Prior kicked through and chased to score, followed a short while later by a Matthew Bevan try. Rochford were unlucky not to get a win from this period, on one occassion they had a clear overlap, but went for a long pass to the winger ,which went to ground, rather than playing it safely through hands, the session therefore ended Shelford 10 – Rochford 10.

The overall score was a bit disappointing. However on the positive side, the 3 players returning from long term injuries all played well, and all Rochford players got to play their part, and apart from the middle session, Rochford did well against a very good Shelford side.