Score: Old Pauline II 41 - BBBRFC 14

From the outset the Baa Baas new they were up for big game against the OP IIs. However, the Baa Baas let themselves down in many aspects of the game and while the final score perhaps shows a solid defeat by no means did the opposition "outclass" us. The OP IIs are a team the Baa Baas can and will beat in the future but on the day their undefeated record for the season stayed in tact.

The game started with a heavily adjusted team as our Kiwi contingent managed to "get lost" somewhere on the A3 and with 2/3 of our front row missing we started the game with uncontested scrums! Baa Baas, in typical style, rallied in situation and held the score to 0-0 until our full starting team arrived!
It was a very evenly matched first half but a few lapses of concentration saw gratuitous tries handed to the opposition - 2 from intercepted passes and 1 from another opportunistic follow through from a hack grubber kick! Without reason BaaBaas had given up 17 points with OPs scoring all points against the run of play !

The Baa Baas fought back and it was in the later half of the first half
an outrageously high and late tackle was made on Mark De St Croix that could only be described as a "Clobbering". This resulted in a Yellow card to the opposition but how and why he wasn't red carded was beyond most of us! If I could quote the referee at this stage …"Old Paulines's are down to 10 men!!!" …I think this was indicative of the Ref's game as a whole - he may as well have been refereeing a Football match because he had obviously no idea we were playing rugby!!!!

This late tackle fired up the team and quite appropriately it was Mark De Croix who finished of some solid work form the forwards and crashed over the line. 17-7 at half time.

The second half unfortunately deteriorated for the Baa Baas. Frustration seem to set in and Daniel Tuffery (AKA Mark De St Croix) was yellow carded for some supple rucking. With less than 10 minutes to go before Full-Time, and with some colourful expletives directed towards the refreee Daniel managed to successful upgrade his yellow card to a red one.

While it would be best to forget the whole second half there were phases where we did show our true potential. To the Baa Baas credit we fought it out to the end. The Baa Baas eventually scored after several driving phases. This was the final try of the day, with the forwards pushing Mark Abraham over just under under the posts. Final score
41-14.

Simon Slee