Powergen Midlands 2 East

Ampthill 12 Kettering 20  

‘Blues win on the road"

It was clear from the home sides pre-match tactics, allowing their own Colts to warm up at the same time, and on the same area of the field as Kettering, on an already "claggy" pitch, that the visitors were going to get no favours from their Bedfordshire hosts. So it turned out, as Kettering were made to work extremely hard for the 2 points on offer in this Midlands 2 East league game.

Ampthill started well, and playing down the slope, early pressure led to a penalty opportunity, which, although being 40-metres out was somehow deemed to be in front of the posts, when the offside offence quite clearly took place 20 metres from where it was given! Fortunately for Kettering justice prevailed and the kick drifted wide of the posts.

This seemed to spur Kettering on, and they began to dominate the game in most phases, although the home side were causing some problems in the set scrum. With Tom Bridgeman pinning the home side back in the corners with some intelligent kicking, and both backs and forwards linking well it was something of a surprise that Kettering's only scores in the 1st half were from an 11th minute penalty from Tim Jones after some great handling had almost led to a try, and then a 28th minute try from scrum half Tom McGoldrick, who showed great pace to charge down a clearance kick and then pounce on the bobbling ball, with Jones adding the extra points, to give the visitors a 10-0 half-time lead.

With the slope now in their favour, and boosted by an early try from Kev Osborne, again converted by Jones, following a controlled lineout catch and drive by the forward pack, who were benefiting from a sin-binning for one of the Ampthill forwards, it appeared to be plain sailing. However, Ampthill had other ideas, and in the 60th minute a good move in the centre led to a converted try, as Kettering now suffered from the loss of hooker, Chris Davis with a yellow card, and suddenly Kettering nerves began to show.

Jones then steadied the ship with a well struck penalty after 67 minutes, before poor defence by the Kettering side allowed Ampthill to take further advantage of the extra man and score an unconverted try in the 70th minute.

Restored to full numbers Kettering weathered the storm and the last 10 minutes were scoreless to give the Blues a much needed 2 points, which keeps them well in contention for the top two places, particularly after Newark's fine win over leaders Syston, which opens things up for all the sides at the top of the table.

With Ampthill 2nds pulling out of the 2nd team league fixture, Stockwood Park 2nds pulling out of the 3rd team league fixture, and the other sides, apart from the Vets, not having fixtures, Waverley Road again suffered from lack of games, after last weeks similar events, as it would seem that Christmas shopping has become the priority for many players these days?!!

The Vets, ironically, played against an Ampthill "3rd" side, which did make the trip to Kettering, and tries from Pip Ling, Jan Donalek and Andy Roberts, showed that the "Oldies" can still compete against much younger and fitter opponents, although the visitors did score several tries of their own to run out convincing 39-15 winners. Skipper Neil Price, however, was extremely pleased with his sides performance both on and off the field, and would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!! 

 

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