Rochford U10s vs. Thurrock, 6 February 2011

We already knew that Thurrock were going to be tough opponents from the Upminster Festival earlier in the season.

If it was the rucking that came together to great effect in the first match it was mauling in this. While Thurrock were physically much bigger, Rochford managed to drive them back on a number of occasions. This included one drive from Christopher Martin, Nicholas Campen and Christopher Hastings which drove Thurrock back 20 yards to their try line. Only a failure to get decent ball from the maul stopped Rochford from scoring

Thurrock continued to attack and scored regularly, not due to errors by Rochford but by using their physical presence to make them hard to stop. Certainly they were not technically any better than Rochford and possibly made more handling errors, spilling the ball more.

Mid-way through the half the ball was passed to Christopher Hastings, making his first start of the season, who went on one of his trademark mazy runs which ended with a high tackle, rightly punished by the referee. It was clear that Chris didn’t want to get mad but to get even and on Rochford’s next attack refused to be stopped and skipped through two defenders and touched down.

After another Thurrock attack broke down, and with Rochford moving towards halfway the ball was passed out to Brandon Smith on the wing. Although it didn’t look like there was room to make ground Brandon set off and out paced the Thurrock defence to score in the corner. A well worked and well deserved first try for Brandon.

Half time: Rochford 10 Thurrock 20

The second half began much as the first had finished. Thurrock continued to use their size and strength to break through the Rochford defence and Rochford attacking well but not getting the final ball that would have seen us score. We did score one more try with almost a repeat performance from Christopher Hastings weaving through the Thurrock defence and outpacing the full-back to score his second of the match.

Full time: Rochford 15 Thurrock 40

To those of us watching this match it was clear that the result was not a fair reflection of the game. The size of the Thurrock boys clearly made stopping them a challenge but with better ball from Rochford mauls it would have been much closer.

After some lean times the Under 10 squad is growing and the players are developing well as individuals and as a team. All thirteen should be proud of their performance. Some hard work on the training pitch between now and the Eton Manor Festival could make us serious contenders.