When West Bridgford welcomed Nottingham Casuals last season, it was a tough set of fixtures for Casuals. We were anticipating another tough test today and the players were prepared to be strong.

Two good sized squads meant that there was a great opportunity for players to form a Barbarians team to so that two matches could be played and give plenty of playing time to everybody. Well done to Hedley, Freddie and Harry for putting their arms straight up and making up the team and joining West Bridgford players. They played really well and demonstrated their abilities.

The other pitch featured the Casuals and West Bridgford. This game started really brightly, and early exchanges featured tries by both sides and plenty of physical play and strong rucking. Sery began to lead Casuals charge with a fierce tackle that was followed by another, and another. Casuals were beginning to take control. Dominating in the rucks created turnovers. We’ve been working on stealing the ball and it’s great to see when it happens. Casuals’ control started to turn into tries as some smart interchanges and offloads opened up space for Wilf to run through for tries. West Bridgford kept going and pushing and Casuals responded and were relentless in their tackles.

The second game started in the same vein as the first. Benjamin continued his strong running and scored an unanswered hat trick as West Bridgford couldn’t deal with his strength. Ayla caused chaos in the defence running as she ran through. The resulting offload made space for Rory to dance over the line. West Bridgford had an ace up their sleeve and brought on a towering and strong replacement and he gave the Casuals players a problem to deal with. From the free pass, the ball went to the replacement who steamrollered through for an easy try. Play continued and Casuals gave away a free pass for entering the ruck from the side. Again, a free pass to the towering replacement resulted in a try. Casual’s players were challenged with how to stop the new threat……..teamwork. As West Bridgford tried the tactic again, a tackle came in, then another, then another as the defenders swarmed to wrestle the ball away.

Player of the week was Oliver for his impressive improvement and all round play in the game. TREDS Player of the week was Hedley for volunteering for the Barbarians team, demonstrating the core values and showing West Bridgford what he’s made of.