Surrey Youth U17 League 2
Kings A 18 - Cobham B 19
16 April 2010 – 7.15 pm kick-off
For the first time, the Cobham lads had the experience of playing a league – or indeed any other – game under floodlights. The evening at Kings’ ground in Motspur Park benefitted from the remnants of a gloriously sunny day that rapidly turned very crisp under the clear evening skies, brightly lit by the floodlights on the First XV pitch.
The U17’s were strongly supported by Cobham U16’s, helping to make up for absentees due to holidays, injuries and clouds of volcanic dust spreading from the north.
The first fifteen minutes of the game saw Kings score an early try (unconverted) to take a quick 5-0 lead. Wake up lads!!
However, this score was matched by a try from Max Peacock which Ed Jones converted to make it 5-7.
A penalty for Kings in the Cobham 22 gave the hosts an opportunity to take back the lead, which they duly did – 8-7
After this, the game became rather scrappy with both sides guilty of passes not going to hand (I almost typed “dropped balls” but of course the lads are far too old for that to happen!!), missed tackles, kicks being charged down, penalties and decisions going every which way. These latter elements occurred throughout the match, and - on balance - Cobham were probably the net beneficiaries overall.
A number of promising Cobham attacks broke down (back to balls dropping again) until Matt Jones stole the ball from a Kings scrum in their own 22 for Ben Allchurch to score a try. The conversion was unsuccessful, so the score stood at 8-12.
The first half finished on a nigh for Cobham, with that score and other promising attacks
However, the second half started like the first, with Kings scoring a quick try, again unconverted. Stay awake lads!! The score was now 13-12.
Now the Cobham lads did wake up, and fortunately went deaf (as you’ll soon see).
An excellent assault on the Kings line led to the ball being grounded, but the referee was unsighted and awarded Cobham a 5 metre scrum. Running the penalty that was awarded to Cobham from the scrum seemed the wrong decision to Cobham’s coach and spectators alike – they were all screaming “Take the points” and “Kick the penalty – don’t run it”.
But the Cobham lads had confidence in themselves, ran the penalty and Ed Jones darted through to score under the posts. He converted his own try to make the score 13-19.
The Cobham coach and spectators all congratulated the lads on using their initiative.
Cobham’s most fluent and effective multi-phase attack then followed, but disappointingly ended with another dropped ball and a scrum for Kings in their own 22. Cobham successfully and strongly disrupted two Kings put-ins, but they won the third and streaked down the field to score – 18-19 with a fair few minutes to go!
Cobham really started to dominate now. They kept Kings in their own half but let them off the hook with some poor tackling.
Tempers also started to fray.
A late, high tackle on Ed Jones saw Kings down to 14 men, with less than 10 minutes to play. The ensuing penalty kick stayed just in play, for Cobham to have a lineout on the Kings 5 metre line (thanks David!)
Tempers started to fray a bit more!
Cobham appeared (at least to their coach and supporters) to have scored, but the ball wasn’t grounded to the referee’s satisfaction.
A series of further 5 metre scrums for Cobham – tempers totally unravelled by now - didn’t lead to a score but did see Laurence Bolton kick the ball into touch for the end of the game.
Cobham won 19-18, the 4 points taking them to the top of League 2 with one match to play.
