Unlucky Thirteen?

Brighton were at Uckfield for the under 13’s first league game, having to play thirteen-a-side and even more eerily their stand-out player was number 13.

In the distance a wolf howled. ….(although it might have been a donkey from the horse sanctuary next door on reflection)

It was the sort of aligning of astral forces that would have had Russell Grant polishing one of his balls so furiously Mystic Meg would need both hands to steady his wand.

Having read a couple of this season’s match reports I knew that Uckfield are struggling for numbers (which is a great shame) and that one player in particular could carry the ball.

In spite of this there was nothing in the tea leaves to suggest that they would ask us to only field 13 players quoting the continuum as issued by Twickworts in the summer. This was an interesting interpretation of the rules and in the absence of our legal wizard and in spite of the fact that it would wrong-foot the work we have been doing with our starting 15, we agreed. We could of course have played with 14 or even asked them to concede but that wouldn’t really have been a satisfactory option…… so long as we won of course.

The Twos had a lot of possession in the early spells of the game but a ridiculous number of knock-ons, forward passes and other fundamental mistakes meant that we didn’t trouble the scorer. Each error was spotted by the excellent referee who didn’t miss a thing nor give a single questionable decision all game. That said, surely it was only a matter of time before we would go through the phases and touch down for an opening try to settle the nerves?

You would have thought so but their 13 started picking up good fast ball and making runs through the centre of our defence, ultimately scoring with a great solo effort. The reaction of the Uckfield players and supporters to their first try spoke volumes about their expectations. Another great passage of play saw Uckfield go two tries up with some excellent work and a backs touchdown near the posts. This was beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable…..maybe I shouldn’t have killed that black cat with a broken mirror under those ladders on the way to the ground?

We were 12 – 0 down and towards the end of the first half ‘He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’ set off on another fantastic run and, having broken through two Brighton tackles was romping towards the try-line. A place he must be all too familiar with.

Our big second row forward and, it has to be said not the fastest lump on the training pitch went after the 13 (who must have been thinking about his try celebration) like a man possessed and with huge determination absolutely nailed him. Some were already turning to get ready for the conversion but it didn’t happen. It was the tipping point of the game really because we went into the break 12-0 down not 19 – 0.

At half time we spoke about what was going wrong. It was true that we were forced into making unusual positional changes to accommodate Uckfield but player for player we were better than them. They had a couple of big mobile boys doing most of the damage but we were by and large tackling everything and doing well against a bigger pack. We were making poor decisions and far too many handling errors but we had the skills, fitness and physicality to get back into the game.

It also has to be said we have recruited well; we retain our players and had a strong bench to look to, a luxury that Uckfield do not have but surely they can’t expect all league opposition to agree to play with less than fourteen?

We scored two tries early in the second half, were level at 12-12 and starting to dominate the rucks, open play and even winning the occasional scrum against their well drilled pack.

Uckfield had played their Rugby for the day in the first half and with no substitutions were visibly tiring. They had played well and made good use of their quick hands to bring their impact players into the action and had given us a game. Although we continued to make fundamental errors even under far less pressure the tries kept coming and we ended comfortable winners.

Quite a strange one for the first league game but we managed to deal with it a measured second half display that saw us put 31(13 backwards!) unanswered points against a depleted, largely one dimensional but nonetheless highly spirited opposition.

We do have a big squad of good players and although our skills were not what they can be we had the confidence to overcome a very poor start. Shirts, ties and exemplary behaviour in the clubhouse followed where we were very well looked after. There were a number of stand-out performances but there are areas of our game that still need more work and that can only be fixed on the training pitch because, as Stevie Wonder very accurately pointed out, Superstition ain't the way…..

Uckfield (12) 12 – Brighton (0) 31

Tries:
Edward 2
Angus 1
Regan 1
Oskar 1

Conversions:
Max 3