Penn - a brace

Flather - a brace

Quote of the day:

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It was a dry crisp afternoon, with more than just a hint of 'nip' in the air that belayed the poker hot struggle that was always prognosticated. The Baa Baas proud unbeaten record this season was on the line, and Barns wanted revenge for last years defeat, no scrimshanker would be tolerated on this day. After a delayed kick off to find a referee the Baa Baas started badly, a knock on in the centres gifted Barnes their first of 3 tries. The 3 weeks off were beginning to tell. But it only strengthened the resolve of the men in Black. Pressure was immediately exerted and a bullocking run of the base of a maul by Jonny Ellis, saw the scores level with only 5 mins played. Both sides knew that the game was now on.

The Barnes side as usual, had a large Pack dominating in the set piece, but when good ball was secured our more mobile forwards and elusive backs always looked likely to prevail. Barnes could see this too, and tempers started to fray, with the hastily acquired referee being tendentious in the extreme, citing Christmas as his reason for goodwill, with did not seem particularly germane at all. Tim Penn scored two good breakaway tries, with Garath Williams kicking us out of our twenty two, though it should have been three. After a great break from Damien Maltwood in the second half Tim took the ball ran half the length of the field, with only one man to beat, tried to sidestep him, but only to fall over 30 centimetres from the try line. Shades of Lardy and the Roslyn Park Hatters winger half his size came to mind, and what we all thought was a formality turned into a five meter scrum. It is testament to the character of our pack that four out of the seven tries scored were by them. Jonny Ellis and Harvey Flather scoring two apiece, supported ably by Haydn Simpson and Ed Cully. Harvey's second try was the product of a text book back row move that, any International side would have been proud of.

Half way through the Second half the Baa Baas were pinned on their line of ten to fifteen minutes, and with only a small lead they were determined to keep barns from breaching their line and with great resolve, fortitude they held, with superb last ditch defending and organisation, that belayed just a pub side. A special mention to Omar Haji, who agreed to play Prop on his debut for the Baa Baas, only to receive a nasty cut and a visit to hospital for his pains. With no replacement prop we had uncontested scrums for the rest of the game denying Barnes their strength and the victory was assured sealed with a breakaway try from Lachy Monroe. The game degraded into a melee of flying fists and knees from Barnes, but the real fight had been knocked out from them.

Many thanks also to an overseas member Jerry Boucher who, made a vital contribution in the centre, and was unlucky not to get on the score sheet. The final score of 43 - 17 was justice after a hard won game, and the unbeaten run extended into the new year for the first time.

Julian Samuel

Team List:

Ellis, Simpson, Haji, B Romer-Lee, Markey, Lockwood, Flather, Culley, Aird, Homan, Williams, Monroe, Samuel, Penn, Maltwood, Ross