Walsall v Stafford - 28.10.23

Stafford colts were travelling to Walsall for the first time since that warm May night last season when they lifted the Fred Rowley Cup.
Although a bit windy the weather conditions were ideal for a game of rugby.
Stafford were quickly in the rhythm and were trying to impose some high tempo rugby to a bigger pack, trying to find solutions on the outside.
Stafford opened the score through a penalty at the 6th minute, 'captain of the day' Harry Woolman deciding to capitalise on Stafford’s early domination.
We had to wait another 10 minutes to be back in the same position and for our Captain to have the lucidity to ask Scrum Half Dylan Shrehorn to go for points again meaning Stafford were leading logically 6-0 half way through the first half. It was Walsall’s turn to keep the ball and they responded to Stafford’s early dominance with a perfectly executed move seeing their full back crashing under the posts having broken 3 tackles in the process, 7-6 for the Home team after 22 minutes.
This try seemed to sting Stafford’s pride as the rest of the first half was to be totally dominated by Stafford Colts, helped by Walsall going down to 14 players with 10 minutes to go to half time.
Yet Stafford seemed incapable to score a try, “butchering” 3 clear opportunities, 2 of them being knocked forward at the moment of grounding, first by Prop Ben Thomas, then by Jack Raine.
HT Walsall 7 Stafford 6
In the second half a few changes were made in the pack and within 5 minutes of restarting Jack Raine was to finally break Stafford’s try deadlock and come crashing over Walsall’s line in the corner, a conversion that proved too difficult for Sherhorn to convert.
Galvanised by that score and following a great move by Stafford’s back Raine was to score again 3 minutes later this time directly under the posts allowing Shrehorn to increase the score to 7-18.
Now in control Stafford kept pressing and following a series of pick and go by their forwards in the Home’s 22, as it looked obvious Stafford were going to open right, Shrehorn intelligently switched left to Misa Veramu who ran a beautiful line from his wing to come crashing down under the post. 7-25.
Walsall finally reacted and exploited Stafford’s indiscipline through their pack and following a series of pick and go and quickly tapped penalties scored under the posts, bringing the score line to 14-25.
Rather than panic Stafford returned to imposing Walsall some excellent sequences of play seeing the forwards organise pods and suck in the opposition pack into rucks to then let their backs exploit the gaps created with some flowing moves. Ollie Croft was to score with 10 minutes left on the clock , concluding a sequence of almost 20 phases. The conversion making it 14-32 for the visitors.
From the restart that followed Stafford once again started rebuilding similar dominance with phases of play starting in their 22 terminating 5 minutes later with Charlie Kirby grounding the ball in the corner.
The last kick of the day being unsuccessful the Game concluded on a logical score line of 14-37.

Coaches Comments:
We played against a strong Walsall side with a team largely composed of U17 players having rested the majority of our League Squad for the occasion. It was very pleasing to see how well the team worked and it was only through some handling errors that we were not 3 tries up at half time. We never panicked and to be fair never looked in danger. The lads really went through their phases and as much as we have had some results built on individual performances in the past today’s was built on the Team, pods and ruck/ dominance by the forwards, line outs and scrums were good against a strong solid pack. The backs showed what they can do to any defence when they play together; the result was some excellent sequences of Rugby. Special Mentions go to Ben Thomas and Harry Woolman for their first half, both always on the charge. In the Backs, Shrehorn and Millard were constant threats in the Walsall defence.
Finally, a huge well done to Tom Brodrick for what was only his second game of rugby ever and who managed to touch several balls. ‎