« Previous | Latest News | Next »

Droitwich 18 - Aston Old Edwardians 28

Sunday, April 29, 2007

Droitwich's season ended in defeat on Saturday when they were beaten by Aston Old Edwardians in the North Midlands Shield semi-final.

The home side lacked several regular players, and the forwards in particular struggled to contain the strong Aston pack and failed to secure a regular supply of possession.

The early encounters were evenly matched, but it was Droitwich that opened the scoring. A strong run by Mark Strutt saw Droitwich win possession near the Aston line. Scrum half Steve Poke threw a lovely dummy and went over unopposed. Duncan Hughes added the conversion. Hughes added a penalty shortly afterwards.

The visitors hit back, advancing up the field to score in the corner, also adding the difficult conversion.

Hughes had the last word of the half with a well struck penalty from 45 metres out.

The second half started badly for Droitwich as they failed to clear their line, allowing the visitors to apply pressure and score again to take the lead.

As the game wore on the heat took its toll on both sides and errors began to creep in, but Aston used their forward superiority to control the game, and, after a period in the Droitwich '22, they scored again.

This seemed to put the game beyond doubt, but the home backs produced some excellent attacking runs, with Ross Coombes being especially effective.

A sharp break by Sean Walker found prop James Shewell in support to crash over. This gave Droitwich a life line, but with time running out they threw caution to the wind and opted for all out attack. A loose pass in midfield was seized upon by Aston to race home and score to leave the final score line reading 18 points to 28.

A philosophical Ben Cottrell added afterwards “We gave it everything against a side from a higher league, but could not quite get the scores. This brings to an end a remarkable season which we have all enjoyed.”

Section Navigation