Travels with Dinno (4/11/12): Sheffield Part 2: The Revenge

Hello again rugby fans. It is that time of the week when I regale you with my travels around the country in support of Dinnington u13s. This week's fun and frolics were at Sheffield RUFC at Abbeydale Park. This was our second visit of the year and as ever the ties were much anticipated. Local bragging rights were on offer.

The weather was dull and icy cold. The boy had goosepimples on his goosepimples. Like a typical teenager he just stood there shivering. He refused the offer of hot chocolate (which was very nice by the way especially with the bacon sandwich). It didn't occur to him to keep his tracksuit bottoms on. He stood there like a typical teenager grunting when asked questions and trying to convince the world that he is tough and that the icy cold didn't bother him.

So on to the match. First up with the two first XVs. Sheffield quickly set about their business of getting revenge for the absolute thumping they got last time. They went 12 - 0 up. Shortly after a try was not awarded to Dinno but we couldn't see why but then Adam shot down the wing and got one back. The difficult conversion was missed and the score was 12-5. After that we didn't trouble the scorers and Sheffield ran out 29-5 winners. The first XV did not seem to be up for the match and there was possibly a hangover from last week's match. Their usual fluency was just not there and Sheffield made the most of it.

While all this was going on the second XV were spending their time periodically running laps around the pitch to keep them warm and limbered up.

The match started and as with the match a few weeks ago this was a tight affair. The forwards were pumped and were driving and mauling and stealing possession. The thing they did differently this time was that they moved the ball out to the backs. The boy was playing at Fly Half (his fourth position of the season) and seemed to thrive. He is not a natural there as he has no kicking game at all. What he did do was keep things moving. He worked with Sam at scrum half dictating moves and with Kieran and James in the backs. They were communicating with each other. When they got the ball they ran it. The icing on the cake was that they passed the ball early after drawing in the man and created space.

After an aggressive forwards move the ball came out to the boy who popped up a pass to Brad who ran it in  for a try in the corner 5-0 at half time.

The performance continued after half time as before. The boy got into a position near the try line and could probably have run in the try himself but he gave the ball to Kieran who scored near the posts and then Brendan put the conversion over. After that Sheffield started to feed in their first team players partly due to injuries (all three hookers were injured in the matches). They scored two tries due to speed and pace on the break.

Personally I think the draw flattered them a bit. Dinno were worthy of the win. The most pleasing aspect was the all round display. There were forwards running down the wing, making driving runs through the middle of the pitch. When it came to picking the awards after the match the award could have gone to any number of players.

It was rugby at its best. Next week Dinno face Morley in the Yorkshire Cup 2nd round.

PS any suggestions of bias in my reporting of matches is entirely justified because like everybody else involved I am biased. Happy rugby.