Kurtis is leading scorer!

Captain Nigel Breakwell and I arrived at West Bridgeford and immediately saw him, he was over 6 foot tall with a perfect complexion slim in build and powerful and we spotted the fabric of his shorts stretching across his powerful sinuous thighs, and graceful way he glided across the pitch, we did not know his name but we noticed he had a powerful 30 yard pass. He was called Elliot.

Melbourne had a strong team with 20 players all in roughly the right place, Jake Oxspring making his season debut at Scrum Half and Watti moving to inside centre, our pack was very fit and mobile with the quality of Mark Coyne added in the front row, and Chris Williams back from Mexico

West Bridgeford trotted out ad by and large looked older and a little less fitter than the Melbourne team, I for one was pretty certain that they would be strong up front but that we would be fitter and faster and would prevail in the end, (sadly I was wrong)

We had a good warm up and Tony Day had stayed off the beer, spirits were high

From the kick off Mark Coyne made a big hit and Melbourne were on the front foot, Bridgford kicked cleared and Melbourne went offside 3-0 to Bridgeford, immediate restart Melbourne were on the front foot again with a big hit from Coyne again and quick hand saw Kurtis go on for the best looking try we have scored this year.5-3

Then another Melbourne attack and a searing run from Kurtis which was turned over in by Bridgeford and they had the audacity to run the length of the pitch and score 5-10 , I think we all thought this was just a lucky break and Melbourne would prevail, but the game then settled into a pattern. Melbourne did well in the loose and did fine in the scrums and lines but West Bridgeford could almost score at will if they got any ball, the afore mentioned Elliot looked better than anyone else on the pitch and the no8 at was big and strong, they also had two good wings.

Essentially Bridgeford had the 4 best players on the pitch and Melbourne probably the next 15 best.

Melbourne got a try back with Jake going over 12-10 and then it all went wrong in the next 20 minutes Bridgeford scored a further 4 tries, all of them from some way, the most comedy one being the no8 running the length of the pitch from Melbourne possession, Melbourne huffed and puffed, and there was no lack of effort. If we were analysing stats Melbourne had the bulk of the procession and territory but Bridgeford could score and deservedly got to 38-12. They also scored under the posts so the tries were converted.

Fulli got a penalty before half time to make it 38-15

At half time, Jordan and Josh Swapped and Will Butler came on, with Chris Williams going to back row.

Nigel resorted to telling everyone that we loved each other and we played for fun at half time. Things were looking a bit bleak

Melbourne were playing against the wind in the 2nd half but came out firing on all cylinders, Smithie who had lasted all first half made a break and scored under the post 22-38 and then a fantastic run by Kurtis made it 27-38, game on. Bridgeford were being contained better and had switched a few of the team about. We still had 25 to go and Tony day came back on at prop full on energy.

I am not really sure what was going on but West Bridgeford always looked dangerous they always had 3 backs running at Kurtis, I have no idea why, was it our pack not getting across, or us being too narrow and not drifting across or just them being very good?.

West Bridgeford could also defend and where last week, Tommy Line, Alex, and Jack Pearce had made clean line breaks this week they could not

At 21 minutes probably the crutial moment of the match, Bridgford had a line out, got quick ball and a big centre trundled over from about 22 yards out with 3 or 4 Melbourne players either missing him or going too high. It felt at that time that momentum with Melbourne but now we needed 3 tries in 18 minutes which was probably too much to ask.

3 minutes later Kurtis scored again to make it 32-45 and for the last 10 minutes of the game Melbourne huffed and puffed but could not score again and as we were chasing the game probably tried a bit too hard and lost a bit of structure.

The final whistle went 32-45 ish

Very good game, 5 ties to 6 so we were close but not cigar

MVP has to be Kurtis again with 3 tries, surely he can have a crack at leading scorer at this rate.

This was a lot better than the performance against Moderns but was not good enough, we had a lot more shape and did well in the tight. Thanks to Watti and Jake for playing for the first time and out of position, and living, both only wanted to play a half.

Well played Bridgeford, we will play worse than this and win.

And then there was Elliot, it turned out West Bridgeford did not know who he was or where he came from , but I will still look for him for the rest of my Life!