RUGBY REPORT - Saturday 27TH May
Now I don't want to be accused of sour grapes or bad sportsmanship, and I'm never one to dishonor sporting officials, but now I am, these guys were woeful. In their credit however the quality of rugby wasn't much better, enough said about that.
Saturday presented a warm dry day in Broulee with a bumper crowd to support both our boys and the Dolphins.
Flat is the best word used to describe the way the game started, for the Redbacks at any rate. No emotion or charge, no positive vibe at all. Not surprisingly Broulee ran in the first points of the match, leaving Braidwood to trail 7 -0 early on.
The Dolphins try proved to be a quick kick in the posterior for our boys, firing up enough to hit back hard. With some help from borrowed forwards courtesy of Batemans Bay we were able to put on a good drive and find some valuable metres before an unfortunate handling error saw Broulee run in another from 80 out. 14 -0 things weren't looking so good.
Solid defense from Broulee cut our attack to pieces time and time again, sloppy play and countless dropped balls from both teams left play broken and disjointed. Luckily for us Broulee's outside backs haven't been taught to catch, releasing our head from the noose many times.
Down but not out the Redbacks were in need of points before half time. Two or three phases head pummellingly hard forward attack left us 40 out, a quick fire pass from the breakdown to Bryce McMurtrie set it off. Busting the defense he was gone, offloading to Craig Lindner, running strongly with good support from outside only to link with Bryce once more to find the line in the corner. Conversion successful, 14 -7 into half time the Redbacks were definitely still in the hunt.
Hungry and willing the second half started much better than the first. Solid attack and good strong support saw Craig Lindner cross the line only to be held up by some scrambling Broulee defense.A few more setbacks, more handling errors and a whistle happy scrum loving ref put Braidwood once more in a miserable defensive position. From the back of yet another scrum the Dolphins ran the blind, a nugget of a centre carrying a score of Redbacks over the line with him. 19 - 7.
Down but still not out, Braidwood continued to fight on. Not satisfied with his previous effort Craig Lindner once again took it upon himself to run, twist, turn and spin his way through every one in sight to score directly under the posts. Another successful conversion from the boot of Jacob Kain, 19 - 14, had I the time to sit down it would have been the edge of whatever I was on.
Desperate in both attack and defense the Redbacks surged onwards, victory in sight but just out of reach, 5 points down with five minutes to go we tried the last. Shaking hitups, nailing the gaps, anything at all that would get us over but to no avail, beaten back by Broulee's defense which included their whistle. Nails were bitten and hearts were broken.
Without a doubt the toughest game of the Redbacks season, there was no shame in defeat, especially such a close one.
M & T Concreting 3 points this week goes to Bryce McMurtrie, Colonial Motel
2 points goes to Whitey, and the Bendigo Bank 1 point was shared by Tim Moffat and Ferret Allen. Royal Mail Players Player was Craig Lindner. Try scorers were Craig and Bryce with Jacob Kain kicking 2 from 2.
The team would also like to thank Tony Cairns and Rainbow Valley Square Meaters for the magic tape that holds our broken bodies together every week.
No Rugby Union games were played last weekend due to ground closures by Eurobodalla Shire, Bega Valley Shire and Shoalhaven Council. As Always training is Mondays and Thursdays 6:30pm, all are welcome, even Haggiss. Hope to see you there.
Yours in Rugby, Whitey.
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