Unbeaten Run Still Together

Another committed performance keeps the unbeaten run intack

After a three week layoff it was time to get back to competitive rugby and our old friends Duckinfield were looking for revenge from our first game of the season where we narrowly beat them. We travelled with a good strength squad with players knowing they needed to impress to get their starting position for our next game against Sale in a fortnights time.

Duckingfield were great host again all though short of players looked a committed outfit who felt they had the beating of the well drilled Rossendale side. This was the making of a great game. Rossendale decided to help Duckinfield out by lending them there top 4 players for ten minutes each which was a good learning curve for the Rossendale Lads missing key players in various positions.

The game started and was keenly contested game but the Rossendale lads were up for this gifting the Duckinfield side of their Captain and play maker George Allen but rose to the challenge.

It was from a turn over ball the Rossendale lads scored first from a swift handling move along the back line and a fine distributed pass from the under 10 player Joe Below that created the space for Oliver Molloy to crash through and score. The conversion was successfully put over from Ellis Murray
In quick succession Rossendale got back on the score board again as Joe Simpson Crashed through dragging defenders in his wake for the first of his two tries. Again this was converted by Ellis Murray.

The game at this stage was all going Rossendale’s way and with the return of George Allen to there team the game looked as if a big score was on the cards but credit must be given to the Duckinfield Players and coaches of how well they stuck to the task of keeping the Rossendale lads at bay, but eventually just before half time Will Gledhill made a break form short range to skip past the defense for a determined individual effort. Converted again by Ellis Murray. The Half time whistle went and 21 points up the Rossendale lads appeared to think the game was over and how wrong they were.

The start of the second half and Duckinfield took advantage of some poor tackling and threw everything they had at Rossendale and apart from some resolute tackling from Natasha Smallridge Duckinfield would have scored. This is the third game running where Natasha Smallridge's defence has held the whole team together and her reward was running through to score a try of her own. This time converted by Will Gledhill.

This try once Again just spurred the spirited Duckinfield side on and eventually from some great phases of ruck ball they scored a converted try of their own.

Rossendale then steeped up a gear and finally put the game to bed and a second Joe Simpson Try converted again by Ellis Murray sealed the victory and maintained the teams unbeaten run.
Man of the Match or should we say Woman of the match was Natasha Smallridge who carried on her great run of form with another consistently good performance.
Most Improved Player went to Ben Flannagan for his far more committed performance and the young under 10 star Joe Bedlow playing a year above himself showed the handling skills much older teams would have been happy with.

All in all it was not the best performance of the year but the Rossendale side looked to run ball wide and experiment. It was a good performance but there are stronger challenges ahead but we are still unbeaten.