Farnham U13As take superb first win in the league vs Reeds

Wow - What a game!

The Reeds squad had arrived at Monkton lane early and were already looking slick by the time the Farnham boys took to the pitch for their warm up at 9:45. They were clearly a well drilled side and looked well prepared for their morning's work. There was some consternation from a few of the Farnham parents at the sheer size of some of the Reeds boys, particularly their enormous lock and an equally tall number 8! Fingers were well and truly crossed.

The Game started slightly after schedule at 10:35 as Finlay popped up a well judged drop kick, which was well taken by Reeds. Reeds held onto the ball for the first few minutes but the Farnham boys didn't panic and with some superb work at the breakdown, managed to take control. For the next 20 minutes, the Farnham boys played out of their skins denying Reeds the oxygen of possession. They rucked and mauled superbly. They played the phases. They created a platform. They delivered precisely the strategy the coaches had mapped out for them and it all began to look like a slightly more intense Thursday evening training session.

It wasn't long before all this great work and an astonishing work rate delivered a try. A super performance by the forwards popped the ball into Aston Ulisse's hands and he weaved silkily past a bemused gaggle of Reedonians to pop in a try to the left of the posts. Finlay's metronomic boot delivered a neat conversion to leave Farnham 7-0 up. Confidence was high.

Reeds restarted but the kick off only served to deliver the ball directly into Farnham hands where it stayed for most of the next 10 minutes. A small mistake in handling allowed the ball to go temporarily to Reeds who ran it up to the Farnham 22 from where it fell to Finlay to relive the pressure with a kick out of hand towards the Reeds fullback. The bounce was cruel and the Reeds 15 fumbled the ball allowing it to be collected by Aston from somewhere around his shoelaces having put in an Usain Bolt like run to get there in time to catch it. The touch down was by then a formality as was another Finlay conversion.

At 14-0, the scoreline was already looking healthy but the boys had no plans to ease up the pressure and three minutes later they were rucking their platform towards the try line once more. George Guy set off on one of his darting runs and at one point seemed to have half the Reeds side on his back yet still managed a nice offload to Chris Ratcliffe who boshed his way to the try line handing-off three Reeds tacklers in the process to take the scoreline to 19-0. George stepped up to attempt the difficult conversion from the far left side of the pitch and only just fell short.

A few minutes later, a penalty allowed George to kick the ball off the pitch to allow the ref's whistle to indicate the end of a breathless first half. Reeds seemed a little shellshocked at the ferocious pace the Farnham boys had delivered.

From the kick-off in the second half, Reeds came out fighting. Their coaches must have given them a stiff talking to at half time and the Farnham boys were always going to need more than a handful of Jelly Babies to be able to keep up the pace they showed in the first half. Honours were shared for the first 15 minutes of the second half but Reeds had more of the possession and despite a valiant defensive effort, eventually the wall had to crack and when it did it allowed the darty Reeds 13 to dive over the line. A conversion followed to bring the scoreline to 19-7. During this defensive effort, the boys put in some superb tackles and credit must go to Louis Thomas who did his usual crunching job.

By this time, with maybe 10 minutes left on the clock, the Farnham boys were really beginning to flag and sensing a come-back, the Reeds boys put in a magnificent shift to produce another try. This was not converted to leave the score at 19-12 and moments later the final whistle was blown.

What a performance! The whole team were done in but happy to have won so convincingly. The opposition coaches congratulated the boys on their superb rucking and mauling. Ref Paul was impressed that the boy's discipline was so good, the penalty count having been dramatically in their favour, particularly in the first half before fatigue set in.

This was a whole team performance and all the boys should be congratulated. Special mention goes to the forwards in general and to Max C-H in particular for the number of turnovers achieved. George Guy had a great game at scrum half and Finlay's kicking, both from the tee and out of hand was superb. Two top tries from speedster Aston and great forwards try finished by Chris were a just reward. All in all a great day at the office. Well done all!

Steve