As the road warriors converged on Chatterton on a cool Sunday in April to head to Burnaby, the thoughts going through a lot of our heads were ”This is a lot of Forwards”. 14 players were accounted for with a few supporters in tow(Bob Love, Draino, Myself, Millard and Johhny Lyles significant other Mel and Jim Turner). Of the 14 we had 11 forwards and 3 backs which called for an interesting lineup and some playing out of place.
As we boarded the bus to head to Burnaby a dark cloud over the Burnaby Area could be seen in the distance and would for sure bring conditions that are not conducive to clean play that we all know and love.
Luckily as the Road Warriors took the field, besides sub 10 temperatures the rugby gods staved off the rain which made for a pretty clean game.
With our Forward pack made up of Grizzled vets the backs welcomed Mike Joss at number 12, Jeremy Harvey at number 13 and Don Swainson pulling on the number 15 Jersey joining Paul Cao(9) Rob Phillips(10) and Sean Ross(11). The game plan would be forward driven(Literally) with some well-timed crash runs by Joss and Harvey. Twits were able to loan us a few players that helped us round out the squad to 16 players.
The game started with some good forward play as the Ebbtide were able to dictate the play from the breakdowns and lineouts. But as the game went on the Twits were able to find chinks in our armor with some well-placed kicking and runs from their backs. Twits scoring 5 tries to our one scored by Paul Cao towards the end of the 1st half.
With a rousing speech from Captain Paul Eby, the tide came out strong tackling well and again putting together good phases but alas did not result in the tries that we needed to get back in the game as the Twits would score another 10 minutes into the second half. But with the never give up attitude Ebbtide put together a solid few plays that sprang our number nine to score the last trie of the game which in Oldboys rugby means a win.
Final Score Twits 6 Ebbtide 2. Bob Love had a quiet day only having to go out to the field once to check on a player and no major injuries to report for this game. That being said please heed Dr Loves advice for cleaning scrapes after showering, just ask Captain Paul Eby!
As the boys headed into the change rooms the effort given especially for those playing out of place was indicative of what rugby is all about. Whatever I need to do to help the team I will.
Back in the clubhouse Paul Cao was the Twits choice for Man of the Match while Ebbtide chose the Twits number 10(not sure of name). The coveted Red Jacket went to Don Swainson for his inspiring words throughout the game.
A special shout out to Jaime Avantini who worked on an excellent meal of Chicken Rigatoni with Italian sausage and side salad, an excellent meal after a hard fought game.
That was the final road game for the season, only 2 games left before the summer break. See you all at the Mac for Ebbtide vs NOBS Saturday April 27th.
Cheers,
Jonathan “Can run for 10 minutes on a treadmill” Romphf
