Men of Steel

A good Heston Blumenthal recipe is surprising, exciting, inventive and full of balance and complimentary ingredients - a bit like the perfect rugby performance! And whilst our fourth defeat at home in as many weeks at the hands of an excellent Cleve side wasn’t quite the perfect recipe it was definitely a very big leap in the right direction and showed many of those attributes are now beginning to come to fruit.

It may seem strange to be so upbeat about another narrow loss but on this occasion I know everyone gave 100% effort in defence, played with enormous heart and really, really came together as a team. As a coach you can’t ask for a lot more than that. Some of our recent performances, particularly last week, have severely lacked a defensive bite and this has led to us leaking some telling and decisive trys. However yesterday was a completely different story as we stepped up to the mark and showed amazing intensity in defence and hopefully proving we have learnt from the lessons of previous games. The play at times was nothing short of brutal and it is testament indeed that with no substitutes we traded blow for blow (almost literally at one point!!!!!) with our opponents, took the knocks and carried on regardless. It was undoubtedly a game for fathers to be proud and mothers to wear earplugs and hide eyes behind fingers, as 30 odd kids put on a real display of camaraderie and committed rugby well beyond their years. I think I can safely vouch for players, coaches, parents and supporters from both sides that, that beautiful sunny Sunday morning was enjoyed thoroughly by all. So much so I shall refrain from any negative/constructive comments about how we could have gone about our organisation and offensive decision making and concentrate only on the good stuff! Notables were Jlo starting to get low and tackle, Mccauly ripping the ball off a rather big chap and fantastic aggressive running, Tyler tackling then driving into touch a player who looked certain to score, Chaz flicking the switch instead of his hair and almost cutting a poor guy in two with an enormous hit that sent shockwaves through the county, The Ox put his life at risk by jumping in front of an oncoming steam train, taking the sting out of his run so everyone could jump on him, Woody was basically everywhere and worthy of his man of the match accolade, Dans passing under pressure was excellent, Captain Mac kept his temperament and team just below boiling point, Rudsta stepped into hooker seamlessly and at one point hunted down a tackle like a lion chasing a gazelle, Ricardo and the tornado were in full effect chopping down all comers, Reuben was back to somewhere near his best with dancing feet, I could go on and on ………everyone was truly awesome.

We were actually due for a training session this week but Cleve rang on Saturday morning due to our senior 1st team game being called off and I committed us to another trip into the unknown against a team we have never played. As a player I know what a well organised and strong club Cleve are and had heard what an excellent youth set up and successful team they have. However nothing could have prepared me for my Sunday morning wake up call. On arriving at the pitch pretty much every one of our parents and players asked me whether we were playing “those big guys over there” pointing towards some giants in the corner doing some very impressive and slick pre match drills!!!! Now, plenty of our guys aren’t shy of the sweet trolley and we have a sprinkling of height as well, but they were literally dwarfed by some of the Cleve specimens! As coaches we did our best to play down all this and instil some confidence into the troops, whilst secretly knowing they would have to show a massive improvement, possibly an impossible improvement, on the tackling front to avoid a whitewash – how wrong we were! And as it transpired Cleve were not only big they also had a great deal of skill and a very good understanding of phases of play. Which only provides further proof of how much Clevedon pulled together, matched them and but for the dodgy ref (again) and a last gasp try would actually have just nicked an improbable victory. The fact that Clevedons two trys came from Tom W and Mccauley only goes to prove further that good things don’t always come in big packages! Well done “super 12”, I’m very, very proud of you, however a high precedent has now been set and I will expect more of the same each and every week from now on.