Liverpool University Vets 1st XV 0 – 33 Lymm Eagles
Eagles Team Match Report | Saturday March 9 2024
Veterinarians Fail To Put Down Soaring Eagles
With their first 3pm Spring kick off, Lymm Eagles produced a confident and highly entertaining performance against youthful Liverpool University Veterinarians side. This was a game where the Eagles did the basics extremely well and used their powerful pack and dynamic backs to great effect.
Following a convincing win in their last game against Moore, Eagles have had a 3 week break in play. The question was, would Lymm be able to maintain their momentum and repeat their performance against promotion chasing Liverpool Vets. Long breaks between games can allow time for the injured to recover and wives and partners to be placated with a weekend together. However, the limited fitness that regular playing provides, can quickly evaporate and no amount of deep heat or WD40 can get those underused muscles or arthritic hips moving again.
The Eagles arrived at the Wyncote Sports Ground with a sense of trepidation. Back in September, the Vets gave Eagles their largest defeat of the season to date and the memory still lingered in the players’ minds. Limited player availability meant that Captain Ollie Brown had to make several changes to the team that beat Moore. Soheil Kakai was brought in to the front row to replace Craig Capewell. Martin “Henders” Henderson took up the scrum half position in the absence of Chris Kinsey. Mercurial fly-half Alan Reddecliff returned to guide the team. Reece Forrest returned to the centres to replace the absent Rick McEvoy and Ryan Brown was drafted in on the wing to cover the missing Josh McKean.
The Eagles sauntered out of the warmth of the changing room at 14:50 to the pitch for a quick warm up, chat and Ref’s briefing. The Ref had already had to ask the Eagles for a favour as it turned out that his eldest daughter had stolen his socks from his bag. It was hoped that the Liverpool Vets wouldn’t notice the Ref was running round with socks with LYMM stitched into the back of them. At 14:57, the Vets decided to return to the changing room, which despite only being 100 yards from the pitch, seemed, in the Eagles eyes, a colossal waste of energy. The pitch was soft underfoot and holding up well. However, this may have been due to the huge amount of goose shit covering the field, courtesy of the Canada Geese resident on the large pond next to the pitch. Certainly, a novel fertiliser.
The Vets kicked off and play in the first 10 minutes was a scrappy affair whilst both teams sized each other up. Lymm used their power game well, with strong carries from Ben Lloyd, Kieran Williams, and Reece Forrest. However, any momentum was halted by unforced handling errors or well executed jackaling from the Vets. Unfortunately, the Vets lost one of their props to injury in the first scrum, which Lymm had clearly dominated. Mumbles of “uncontested” were heard but fortunately, the Vets had a spare prop on the bench. This was good news, as the Eagles knew their scrum was key weapon in their arsenal. Time went on but neither side seemed to be able to get the ascendancy, with the remaining play being kept predominantly between the 22m lines. Lymm continued to use their powerful forwards to great effect, whilst the Vets tried to instigate a kicking game to pin Lymm back. However, Lymm’s back three of Chris Mundy, Ryan Brown and Liam Sullivan were more than a match for this, with Mundy called upon several times to field high balls and did so with confidence and skill. On 18 minutes, Lymm secured a lineout in the Vets 22 and moved the maul forward. Scrum half Henders found fly half Reddecliff in space and Alan drew in the opposing defenders and slipped the ball to centre Simon Beards. Beardo only had the fullback to beat but selflessly passed back inside to fellow centre Reece Forrest who went over for a try. The final pass from Simon was described as extremely flat, whilst others used the words blatantly forward. Either way, the try stood. With very short upright on the posts, there was some confusion with the conversion as one flag went up and the other stayed down, so it wasn’t given (0-5).
Lymm gained in confidence from the score and pressed on with their game plan, but still couldn’t find the final pass to unlock the Vets defence. Captain Olly Brown mixed it up by bringing on his bomb squad forwards in the shape of Mike Clarke, George Harrison, and Ben Polec. The youthful Vets though were starting to increase the pace of the game and were very good at hunting down lone Lymm runners. Several Eagles players were guilty of ruck watching and several opportunities were missed. The scrum was still going well, and tight head prop Dave Coon was enjoying his own personal battle with his opposite man. The Vets prop seemed to take offense at everything, complaining about early binds, not pushing straight, being taken too low, the colour of Dave’s head guard etc, until the referee paused the scrum to admonish the moaning miscreant saying “All you have done is complain, he has done absolutely nothing illegal, he is just better than you, plus he lent ne his socks” which caused a few chuckles from the other players and spectators alike. Play proceeded without score until the 34th minute when a great break from Forrest was supported by full back Liam “Sully” Sullivan, which got Lymm to within a few metres of the line. Quick hands got the ball to Reddecliff, whose final pass found Ben Polec, who dived over for a try, converted by Reddecliff (0-12). The half ended without incident.
Half Time: Liverpool University Vets 1st XV 0 – 12 Lymm Eagles
The Eagles were good value for their points lead but knew that the Vets had the energy levels to score tries quickly and an increase in playing intensity was expected. Captain Brown asked for redoubled efforts in defence and to improve the general level of communication, texts but not WhatsApp preferred. Young Finn Henderson was brought on in the back row to play alongside his Dad.
The second half kicked off and almost immediately the pace of the game and passing speed increased with the ball being treated like a hot potato. This opened gaps in the Lymm defence and several last ditch tackles were required to stop the Vets breaking through. On 47 minutes, a great tackle from Finn Henderson allowed Lymm to steal the spilled ball and drive towards the Vets line. Quick passing and safe hands got the ball to Reddecliff, who fizzed a delightful ball across the face of the defenders to Ben Lloyd who scythed through the smallest gap and rampaged up the pitch. Dragging several defenders, Ben still managed to offload to full back Sully who sped over untouched for a try, converted by Reddecliff (0-19). This gave Lymm great confidence and seemed to deflate the Vets. Lymm continued to press forward but were met with fierce tackling and excellent defence from the Vets. Even our speedy back 3 were caught on occasions, which has been a rarity in other matches. Eventually on 56 minutes, the Eagles dug deep and started a series moves which culminated in one of the best team tries witnessed by this scribe in a very long time.
A clearing kick was fielded by number 8 Max Ure, who charged back up the pitch. The ball was then passed repeatedly around the pitch with almost Harlem Globetrotters skill levels to almost every Lymm player, with Olly Brown and Ben Lloyd popping up on several occasions. Alan Reddecliff even manged to get the ball out to prop/winger Dave Coon, who was loitering out of position for a rest (Cheers Al!). Stunned into action, Dave crashed the ball up field making good metres before releasing inside to close support which kept the ball moving forward before eventually reaching Max Ure who crashed over for a try, converted by Sully (0-26). An excellent team try. Unfortunately, the game then descended into a bit of a penalty festival, with both teams being guilty of infringements. On 66 minutes, Ben Polec was shown a yellow card for a no arms tackle. A few minutes later, Flanker Kieran Williams was yellow carded for back chat. A Vets player was also shown a yellow card for a nasty looking spear tackle on Olly Brown. Quite a feat to get Olly above the horizontal. The Vets tried to use their numerical advantage to get on the scoreboard, but were met with crunching tackles from Jez Ure, Mike Clarke, and George Harrison. Jim France chipped in with several turnovers that kept the Vets at bay. A cracking run by Sadge on 72 minutes got Lymm back up the field and on the attack. Again, great work from Henders and Alan released Chris Mundy down the wing and although he got close to the line, couldn’t quite make it over. However, good rucking from Finn Henderson secured the ball, which was quickly passed out to Sully, who darted over for his second try, converted by himself (0-33).
The last few minutes of the game became more about the Vets desire to score versus the Eagles desire to keep the opposition scoreless. Despite several forays, Lymm’s defence held firm. A scrum in the last minute descended into chaos as Lymm shunted the scrum back and ended up in a pile on top of the Vets pack. The Vets prop who had moaned all game refused to let go of Sadge’s collar, and Sadge dislodged him as best he could with some physical encouragement, which, unfortunately, was witnessed by the referee and resulted in a red card. Whilst this scribe does not condone violence on a rugby pitch, their prop had been a bit of a d**k all day (thanks for your input on this sentence David!!) and with the Vets prop demanding the death sentence for Sadge, the referee wisely blew the full time whistle and gave Dave Coon his socks back.
Full Time: Liverpool University Vets 1st XV 0 – 33 Lymm Eagles
An excellent result for the Eagles. Lymm have beaten two of the strongest teams in the league in consecutive matches, which is a fantastic effort especially that they kept their opposition scoreless in both. In this match, it was wonderful watching the team with smiles on their faces and playing with a great sense of camaraderie Thanks lads, you really entertained the 3 travelling Eagles fans. A big thanks to the Vets for hosting us, and for playing the game with great spirit and in good nature. Good luck with your promotion push and your upcoming semi-final. Also thank you for allowing Alan to watch your young debutants run naked around the pitch as part of their initiation, he enjoyed it thoroughly.
With no clubhouse to retreat to, the Dovedale towers on Penny Lane served as the debating room for this week’s man of the match. Special mentions this week go to Chris Mundy, who was fantastic under the high ball and kept us on the front foot. Ben Lloyd was a colossus in both defence and attack and was a great pack leader. Martin Henderson rolled back the years to keep the ball moving at speed and his brilliant interception in the 2nd half almost produced a great solo try. Sully continues to score at will and clearly is a potential contender for the top try score award at the end of the season. Man of the match was eventually decided as Alan Reddecliff. Every try involved Alan in some way and he pulled the strings all day. He also managed to get me a free pint at the Dovedale by smashing his own pint glass and then telling the barman it was mine. This just deflected me from my regular choice for MoM in Olly Brown. Commiserations Olly, buy me a pint next time and I’ll see what I can do.
The Eagles are now not back in action until the 23rd March when they travel to Altrincham Kersal 2nd Team, as they seek revenge for our defeat to them a few weeks ago, kick off 15:00 and as always, everyone most welcome to attend. With no 2nd team game next week, either get yourselves over to Leeds to support the 1st team or come up to the club to enjoy a Six Nations Super Saturday.
Team: 1) Solheil Kakai 2) Olly Brown (C) 3) David Coon 4) Ben Lloyd 5) Jez Ure 6) Kieran Williams 7) Jim France 8) Max Ure 9) Martin Henderson 10) Alan Reddecliff 11) Chris Mundy 12) Simon Beards 13) Reece Forrest 14) Ryan Brown 15) Liam Sullivan REP 16) Finn Henderson 17) George Harrison 18) Ben Polec 19) Mike Clarke .
Match Report: Peter & David Coon