Old Bristolians U15 v Gordano U15

In the unfamiliar circumstances of a football pitch on Durdham Down and in a game of four quarters the old rivals met on a windy Sunday. Both home grounds were waterlogged so the teams came onto neutral territory.

A tightly fought first quarter against the wind left Gordano leading 5-0 after persistent pressure resulted in a penalty taken quickly and ball moved to fly half Macey King to go through the the smallest of gaps to score. In really testing conditions both teams put together well constructed phases of attacking play and defended robustly. The vociferous James Hawkins was joined by Sid Vining and Aaron Southey in organising the defence and the whole team showed good line speed and communication to consistently close down the opposition and make good tackles.

The second quarter started in a similar style with Old Bs fiercely fighting back to 5 all pouncing on some poor handling by Gordano who had not adopted their passing to the windy conditions. Gordano struggled to leave their half and retain possession but with firm tackling the second quarter finished still level.

The third quarter started with great pressure and a pressurised ruck leading to an Isaac Barr interception try from halfway was closely followed by a break to send the long-striding Sam Chigbo over to take the score to 15-5. A great breakout from a turnover near their own line led to Matt Eichenberger speeding up the right hand touch line and being tackled near halfway but did well to stay on his feet and pop a pass to the supporting Connor Adams who was tackled just short of the line and reached out to score on the line but was denied when the referee saw a double movement. Gordano kept up the pressure following the breakout and Macey went in for his second and was followed by a Leon Paul try beating the defenders from some way out which pushed the Gordano lead to 20 points. Finally a fierce forward rush finished with an Ed Magromallis touch down that was assisted by a firm shove from Kody Golding to take him over the try line.

At 30-5 down Old Bs came out fighting in the fourth quarter to get back into the game. Their second try followed after sustained pressure when a cleanly hooked ball came out of the back of a Gordano scrum and the Old Bs flanker reacted quickest to kick the ball on and win the race to the line. The game finished with a final Gordano surge and an Oli Grove try to finish a fine Sharks victory of 35.

The whole Gordano team showed their excellent attacking skills but the most pleasing development for the coaches was to see the hard work on defence in training pay off on the pitch with a massive improvement in organisation, line speed and tackling by all 15 players.