Melbourne beat Long Eaton 2s

Match day 7. We were not really sure what to expect at Long Eaton, they were a 2nds team and have a 3rd team and we are just a 2nd team, but our firsts are better than Eaton so who knew. Derby 3rds were playing long Eaton 3rds so maybe we had the wrong fixture.

The run up to the match was not perfect with a number of regular go to guys, Fulli, Will Butler, Nigel, Josh, Alex lloyd and George going walk and at middle of the week it looked like we would struggle to get a credible team, but a bit of Grovelling and Scott offering to play with a broken shoulder, Vets Watti, Pete Welsh, and Chairman Pete Illot agreeing to play we got a team together, with Alex hollingsworth coming back from injury, and Dave Ported available again. Then on the Saturday there was a sudden of influx of players, with Joe Stuart, Joe Thompson, Ed Hames, Danny, Kurtis and Staniforth offering to play plus Alex Dawson and Guy Cooper appearing as if by magic we had a squad of 23.

When we turned up we even found Sam Handcock in the changing room offering to play for the first time this year. All Good!!

Pretty good warm up. punctuated by the longest speech by a ref on record, but by kick off time, the line up looked good, even with a few players in odd positions i.e. Tommy Line at Scrum Half.

Melbourne played with the wind behind their backs and immediately they looked sharper than Long Eaton, loads of good pressure and quick ball saw Pete Illot nip over from 10 yards for a try after 3 minutes 5-0

Tony Day was on fire, Dave Porter seemed very angry about something and big Pete Welsh was in the thick of everything. Alex Hollingsworth and Pete Illott were turning over ball all over the place.

Dave Porter ran through about 8 Long Eaton players but was adjudged to have knocked on, but a try did come, a impressive run by Watti led to quick recycled ball and as the ball went wide, Alex took a big hit that distracted about 3 Long Eaton players, slipped the ball to Scot and then to Jack Pearce to run in 10-0

After 22 minutes Pete Illot received some ball by mistake and the ball was quickly fed to Matt Walker for his first try for the 2nds 15-0, sadly he got a bang during the move and cannot remember it 15-0

Melbourne had a lot of ball but were being a bit greedy, and everyone wanted to score on their own, while playing simple rugby would have got more tries. Melbourne paid the price for this when after 28 minutes Pete Illot Chipped the ball to a Long Eaton player who ran in a try 15-7

It did not really look as if the game would turn, but we did not score again, Jack Pearce and pip day came off and Ed came on at prop and Sam Hancock at full back for their 2nd team debuts. the period to half time was pretty uneventful. Watti ran on to a chipped ball for perhaps his finest moment of the last 5 years, only to be harshly judged offside

All first half the scrum and line out worked well,

Half time 15-7 and the youth were brought on, Scott made way for Joe Stuart, Tommo came on for Watti, Kurtis for Matt Walker, Danny Staniforth for Deano, Alex and Guy in the pack and Jake Walker for Jordan.

Things got pretty loose as soon as the half started, passes out of the back of the hand, off loads, and a spirit of adventure appeared, this resulted in an immediate try with Tommo getting his first try 20-7

The Sam Hancock made a break and looked very tired with 10 yards to go and fed Tommy Line to make it 25-7.

Melbourne had been poor on restarts in the 2nd half, the young lads were very tricky in procession but did not want to know when the ball was kicked at them, this allowed Long Eaton to get procession 5 yards out and the drove over to make it 25-12.

after 16 minutes Long Eaton removed their largest prop, they lost their own put in ball 10 yards out and in the resulting melee Alex Dawson managed to score 30-12.

The next 10 minutes were a bit of a mess really, there were some of the trickiest bits of running and passing and trickery from Melbourne but they spent more time in their own half than they had for the rest of the game. Jack Pearce, Pip Day and Pete Illot and Pete Welsh went back on and with 4 minutes to go, Jack Pearce ran the length of the pitch pretty well to score, handing off half a team along the way to score out on the left. Booko took over the kicking and got our first conversion 37-12 final score.

All in all a very good game, everyone got on, and the old lads did all the work that allowed the young lads to have a good run about in the 2nd half,

Brilliant to see the new players do so well, and to a man they looked like great additions to the squad, 6 ties to 2 and Jack Pearce joins Kurtis on 5 tries for the season

MVP load of great stuff all over, but I am going with Tommy Line at Scrum Half, who did really well

Looking across at the other pitch it did not look like Derby 3rds would to too scary for us.

Thanks to everyone who played and everyone being good about taking their turn on the bench with good grace, good team spirit

Next week Keyworth Away in the league, bit of a must win, please say you are available!!