Redingensians Festival

With the size of the festival reduced because of the timing on half-term and Reading Abbey not turning up, this festival became effectively a three way fixture with Camberley and Ensians. The Ensians B team struggled to match any of the 3 A teams on show and their games were all about the try count that would be crucial on countback later.

We played Ensians B first and won by 5 tries to nil in a fairly routine game. The second game was against Camberley and ended 1-1. They had a couple of big forwards who were very adept at delaying and spoiling our ball at the break down and the game didn’t really flow. The result hinged on two refereeing decision, a try awarded to them when it appeared to most that it had been dropped forward over the line and a try disallowed for us for a hand-off that was a long time before the play was stopped and well after the ball was grounded. In fact most of the spectators thought the try was awarded as play had been brought back to the half-way line for a penalty. Although the sides were well matched and it is not right to blame the officials, it did appear that we did get the result that was deserved.
The following game against Ensians A was won 1-0 by a late try and was a performance that was clearly suffering from the anticlimax of the previous game. There followed the ‘final’ against Camberley which was a stalemate with neither side getting over the line and ended in a 0-0 draw. Camberley took the trophy on countback by virtue of scoring more tries overall on the day. A frustrating day with the third draw against Camberley A this season who without showing perhaps the flair of some of our players were very good at the breakdown and strong in the tackle. More work on the training field needed clearing out at the ruck and getting the ball away from the breakdown quicker.
Nevertheless, the A team’s unbeaten record for the season remains intact!