Bracknell U14s v Weybridge Vandals U14s

Well that was a fun match wasn't it??!! An away fixture at Weybridge was always going to be tough, but the sun was shining and we had over 20 players available so what could possibly go wrong?! The pitch was our first challenge - lots of lovely grass but it had more rolls and undulations than a ride at Thorpe Park! And then there was the ref, but more of that later.....
Bracknell started with our usual slowness, but luck was on our side. The first set of moves led to Weybridge charging down their right wing, Scott half tackled their ball carrier to slow him down and then Ben wrapped him up as he crossed the line. In the try saving tackle of the season so far, Ben rolled him over onto his back and held him up with his legs in the air preventing a score, and we had the ultimate lucky escape.
Then two minutes later we let Weybridge charge down the left wing and break through. They crossed the line but their player tried to be greedy and touch down under the posts, but a cheeky little nudge from Casey pushed him over the dead ball and somehow it was still 0-0.
In the middle of the first half and we started to play some better rugby, and there was lots of scrappy play in the middle of the pitch. The closest we got to scoring was Will suddenly managing to fly-hack the ball from broken play deep into their 22, but the bounce just eluded all our chasing players. And then as half time approached we found ourselves camped deep in our own 22 putting up an epic defence. They finally broke our line and touched down (although the TMO might have spotted a dropped ball?), but they went into half time leading 7-0.
By now we realised that we were playing 16 men, with the ref blowing his whistle every 2 minutes and giving at least 75% of the decisions to the home team. We upped the aggression at the start of the second half and began to dominate long phases of play. Eventually we got to their 22 and allowed Nat to crash through for a great try, and Louis W added the extras for 7-7. Game on!
We continued to dominate as far as the ref allowed, and eventually more pressure allowed "new" Harry to breakthrough and score under the posts - this time safely with two hands unlike his heartstopping one-hander against Chobham!
We then had the most bizarre incident of the season so far. Our subs began singing a Bracknell chant, the ref asked Taran to tell them to stop which he duly did, and the ref then decided he had had enough, blew the whistle early and walked off, which handed Bracknell U14s the win! The apologies we received from their other coaches and their players implied that this was not unusual, but all credit to our boys for staying calm, not rising to the dodgy decisions during the match, and for doing 3 cheers and a tunnel for the Weybridge team.
We will definitely be trying to fit in a home game before the end of the season as we were so equally matched, and we will make sure we have a neutral ref!
by Phil Wells