It all seems vaguely familiar?

...bright skies and sunshine shone on their rugby club as the BB’s again pitted themselves against one of the (wider) areas better teams.

In a remarkably similar pattern to the previous week against London Irish, the first half was somewhat one-sided, before the boys roused themselves in the second half – or at least once they started the second half, which appeared to be 5 minutes after Beaconsfield had started the second half- to score two unopposed tries in the last 20 minutes of the game.

Beaconsfield are a fine side, playing good rugby (and again like London Irish, are one of the few clubs to have more players than Bracknell), and in following the trend from the previous week, after a strong combative start from Bracknell, two quick tries were leaked to one large and strong-running member of the Beaconsfield team, to take a very early 12-0 lead, which soon turned to 19-0 after good breakdown work from Beaconsfield.

The Beaconsfield forward pack were awarded – jointly – the players of the match award after the game for their fine work at the breakdowns, but to be fair, they were made to work very, very hard by the Bracknell forwards, and their post-match accolade was very much a reflection of the strong work on our side too, as the breakdown was anything but one sided. Unlike the scrums where Bracknell certainly had the edge, enjoying the luxury of having sufficient cover and adaptability at the coal-face, with the front row of Ollie, Daniel, Seth and Callum, ably and voluntarily supplemented by the introduction of Hooker Bailey toward the end of the game.

The back row for much of the game of Wallace, Hawkes and Bailey certainly made their presence felt, and in a team of adaptable players, Josh’s re-introduction to the back row was seen to be very successful as he had a committed, and very busy shift there.

As introductions go though, it was Sam that certainly hit the high notes and justifiably earned the oppo’s Player of the Match nomination for his constant terrorising of the Beaconsfield defence with his direct and powerful running, which brought our first try (and start of the comeback) mid-way through the second half.

So four tries and 26-0 down at half time brought the decision that, again, we should concentrate on “winning” the second half. Beaconsfield apparently also had a plan for the second half, as within four minutes of, fair to say, “half-hearted” tackling, we were two more tries and 36 points down. Thereafter, as the Kites literally started circling overhead, what could have been a rout, was averted and reversed by the boys with an application of hardened attitudes, straight running and commitment in defence, dynamism at the breakdown and good sense in going forward. After a number of solid thrusts from Sam, the two Max’s, Matt (who also has several effective bursts in the first half)and Billy, the first try came. Awarded a penalty in front of the posts on the 22m line, the boys threw caution to the wind, neglecting the 3 points, and enabled a rampaging Sam to run straight through their packed defence and score, un-hindered, between the posts. Oscar converting.

Of course, Beaconsfield are a good team, and back they came, but emboldened by the positive approach, all subsequent attacks were repelled with some great defence from backs and forwards alike. Of course, Bracknell were not finished going forward either, and even a slightly less robust team than Beaconsfield would have wilted, and enabled Bracknell to claw back more points. In the end though, just one more try came with the backs offensive defence paying off when “Sniffer” Halley popped up to intercept a stray Beaconsfield pass and fly over in the corner.

So, the last third of the game, was 12-0 to Bracknell, with pride, determination, commitment and a considerable amount of skill to the fore.

Many thanks to our hosts for the day for the excellent playing surface and post-match fayre, and it would be very useful to know how they manage to organise the weather like that!