Dronfield worthy winners of this encounter

14th Sept 2013
Midlands 2 East North

Dronfield 26 Nottingham Casuals 5

This was not an auspicious start to the league campaign, but it must be emphasised that there were 16 un-availabilities from the previous week, so that was not the best preparation for this encounter.
Results in this fixture have been mixed for Casuals, so it was no great surprise that Dronfield proved to be very competitive.

Starting down a slight slope Casuals enjoyed long periods in Dronfield’s half, but could not make the territory count.
Despite winning solid possession from set pieces and getting the rucks & mauls working, the route to the line proved difficult.
Given that Dronfield were sometimes gifted possession in passing moves, the ball being spilled inexplicably at times, when there seemed to be little pressure, Casuals made the task very hard for themselves.
Casuals had to wait until the 22nd minute before they saw any reward for their efforts, and it was the softest of tries, when Antonius Alexious grabbed the ball in the middle of the lineout, and strolled through to the line, looking around, as if waiting for the whistle.

Dronfield opened their scoring when a player was penalised for diving over, and the home side moved the ball quickly away to get over left of the posts, with a conversion to follow, to take a 7 – 5 lead.

The half drew to close without any further scores.

Dronfield were forced into a re-shuffle and their No 8 went to scrum half. He got the ball moving on several occasions, and one of these attacks led to the next try.

This was followed up with yet another good handling move a few minutes later, and Dronfield crossed for a converted try under the sticks.

Casuals were somewhat under the cosh, but still tried to take the game to Dronfield.
Ian Wood was the brought into the back row, maybe a little slower these days, but he showed that he had lost none of his skills since his time as 1st team Captain, before he left for a far off posting in distant Africa.

Unfortunately Casuals were unable to make any headway, and eventually Dronfield got their fourth try to earn the bonus point, leaving Casuals to rue the chances that got away.

Hopefully with players becoming available next week, the game next week against Kesteven will bring Casuals greater success.

The game will be preceded by a lunch at around 1.30, with kick off at 3pm