Bakewell – The Mission!
The Mighty made the hour long trip to picturesque Bakewell on a sunny Saturday afternoon. We know it’s picturesque as we walked through most of it from the changing rooms to the pitch which was a good 10 minutes away. In a much changed line up from the initial side selected, Moderns ambled over the river, through the car parks and onto the pitch…. All but O’Kelly that is who despite being able to see the pitch, had no idea how to get to it. Given that Bakewell only had 14 players as well kick off ensued.
Hirsch captaining the side in the absence of injured Fitton (who sought comfort in a strawberry cornetto purchased from a strategically placed ice cream van) led from the front. Moderns began with a slight wind at their backs and in what was a stop/start first half used the boot of Rollings to good effect to pin back Bakewell. Around 20 minutes into the first half and with O’Kelly now on the pitch, Moderns struck. From another penalty conceded by Bakewell, which the ref brought us back 40 yards as he didn’t deem the territory gained as an advantage (?) Rollings hoofed the ball from inside his own half to their 5 metre line. Bakewell stole the lineout but tapped the ball behind the scrum half who promptly grounded the ball over his own line. From the following 5 metre scrum Armstrong-Holmes picked up from 8 and ran like a lunatic at their fly half who decided coming forward to meet him was a bad idea and Armstrong-Holmes clattered into him on his own line to ground the ball. The extras were added by Hughes and Mods were 7-0 to the good. The rest of the half ebbed and flowed with neither side taking control. Moderns almost scored just before the halftime whistle when Barney Barker took a kick on the full, rounded his man on the opposition 22 and headed for the corner. It looked for all the world that he was going in at the corner until their fullback raced across the pitch to almost decapitate Barker and force him into touch. With no further scores, the ref bought the first half to a close.
The half time team talk centred on the theory that we were making the opposition look good and we needed to ramp up the intensity. Again we kicked off with 14 men as O’Kelly had to run back to his car to put another £1.50 on the parking meter!
As the second period began it was clear that something had to change to focus the collective minds, but what?..... Step forward Messieurs Feasey and O’Kelly. Feasey was snagged at a ruck by the opposition, complained bitterly to the ref who gave the penalty and subsequently reversed the decision once Feasey had decided to remove the aggressors head from his local vicinity. Yellow Card! At this point, Saffer Joe thought it fair to question the decision with the ref, said something out of turn and was also binned for 10 minutes…. God knows what he said or how the ref understood him. I’ve got it on good authority that nobody in the entire East Midlands has ever understood a word Joe has said! Moderns were down the 13. (Note from the editor – the conversation just before Joe’s sin binning went something like this – Ref: “now then second row, let me ref the game”. O’Kelly: “why don’t you f*****g try it then?” – Nobody condones backchat to the ref, but that was bloody funny!)
Although not exactly what we had in mind, this DID have an effect on Moderns and a positive one at that. Players began to put an extra 10% in and this culminated with the best move of the match. From the centre of the pitch, Moderns took the ball right 3 times, excellent pick and go’s to draw in the Bakewell defence gave an overlap on the ‘rewind’. Good hands from the backs and Alcock drew the winger to put Barney in. He rounded the full back to put the ball down beneath the sticks. The conversion was again successful and we were 14-0 up. As the game wore on and with a couple of players short, Bakewell came back into it with a couple of scores of their own. One conversion was crucially missed leaving the Mighty with a 2 point advantage. Further Moderns pressure led to a penalty which Hughes duly converted and there was time for Rollings to burst through two or three tackles to go under the posts. Again Hughes was accurate and the score read 24-12. As time began to slip away, Moderns were comfortably ahead and tried to grab a late forth try to give them the bonus point. Unfortunately this was not to be and a forward pass was called when Barker appeared clean through. The final whistle went and Moderns had got their win.
A good result which gets us back on track after a few weeks of swamp like conditions and cancelled games.
MOTM – Armstrong-Holmes: Got through a ton of work and picked well from the base of the scrum.
DOTD – Alex Mills: For no other reason than he turned up sporting a massive hickie on his neck. |