Maidenhead Colts
13 v Bath Academy 22
Sunday 19th February 2006
Maidenhead Colts stand one win away from sealing their BBO League title but they took time out from their league challenge to meet the illustrious Bath Academy at Braywick on Sunday. Bath's team included England international players and a host of South-West regional stars but Maids gave a wonderful performance to lose by only 22-13, a score which the admiring Bath coaches later confessed did not reflect the true run of the play.
Maids' forwards out up a fantastic show, driving hard at their opponents. The backs shrugged off the loss of kingpin Dave Hodgson, who was ill, and centres Simon Standfast and Chris Adam played remarkable against excellent opponents, with Standfast leading the team admirably. Sam Brown and Tom Plumer were immense up front and it was the collective spirit of the Maids team, which saw them take Bath to the limit.
Bath had lost only to Leicester Tigers this season and beaten a host of Academy teams from the Premiership - their discipline and good spirit was striking, their line-out was excellent and some of their back play in horrible conditions of wind and rain, was remarkable. It was a tremendous occasion, with a large and vocal crowd and the Berks Society pulled out all the stops with three officials, who did an excellent job.
But Maids stayed with them all the way - Maids pulled to within four points in the final quarter and were battering away hard till Bath sealed victory with a breakaway try from prop Mark Frey near the end.
Indeed, it had been Maids who took the lead, with a penalty from fly-half Matt Wardle after continuous pressure. Bath levelled the scores with a penalty then pulled menacingly clear with two tries, both from Ben Mercer, and Luke Cozens added two conversions to his penalty for a 17-3 lead.
But Maids dominated large periods of the rest of the match and before half-time they scored a classic forwards try, driving the ball with power and precision and a stunning charge by Joe Thomas, on to a pop pass from Olly Styles, saw Thomas charge over and the kick from Wardle made it 17-10 at half-time.
Maids continued to match their opponents throughout the second half, with Alex Cannon and the backs making strenuous efforts to break though and Maids had several chances to draw level, but the Frey try at the end sealed a deserved win for Bath - though in one of their closest margins of the season.
Maids play London Welsh at Braywick on Sunday in an all-squad game, kick off 1pm. The Ireland-Wales gave will be shown on the big screen afterwards.
Maidenhead
squad:
Alex
Cannon, Ryan Christian, Simon Standfast, Chris Adam, Sam Stefan, Matt
Wardle, Olly Styles; Sam Brown, Jack Robinson, Carl Corcoran, Tom Plumer,
James Emmanuel, Chris Parrott, Karl Kempton, Joe Thomas. Subs Andrew Mitchell,
Ben Sedler, Mitchell Batten, Jason Ouston, Drew Jones, Adam Dean, Chris
Richardson, Andrew Hogan, Will Grant, Tom Morgan, Grant Shearer, Tim Johnson.
