Manor Park Lots - Not Many Old Wheatleyans
13 Man Stuffing.
The Wheats made a wise decision to travel to top of the table Manor Park with just the requisite 15 “players”, allowing the 2nd XV to field a full strength side. Could this be the day the Wheats finally showed some nuts & bottom beat top?
The game got off to a good start with Wheats winning the toss and choosing to take the advantage of the elements in the 1st half. The early encounters should not have worried the Wheats but they failed to clear their lines and eventually a missed tackle led to a try for Manor Park.
With the scrum looking solid, the line outs at least functioning and Drury showing some pace out in the backs it should have been set for a good hard game of rugby. However, Manor Park scored a breakaway to make it 10-0. When the Wheats had ball they looked competent, often beating the first defender. However, it was evident which of the 2 sides had enjoyed a successful season – Manor Park’s attitude & commitment to the game was a total opposite of the Wheats – they even had support runners every time a tackle was made – cheats! Manor Park scored twice more before the break compared to Wheats one missed penalty. Half time 22-0, however, on the whistle second row Ross & Hooker Tony went down with nasty injuries and had to leave the field. Turning round 22-0 down, up the hill against the wind with 13 players ………. The second half became more of a training session for Manor Park, with Wheats heads dropping, although they did well to stick at it.
Park should be commended for the loan of a front row forward to keep scrum-time interesting, and he was no slouch - narrowly missing out on MOTM.
It truly has not been the season for the Wheats this year, we will look to salvage some pride in the remaining fixtures this season, starting with a tricky fixture vs Standard at home this week. One eye is also looking towards next season with the imminent implementation of the short to medium term strategic development plan.
MOTM: Macca. Defended well and was the Wheats best ball carrier.
DOTD: Gillam, see below 1to 15 team effort this week. Well done boys.
- A Hibberd: 6/10 – good come back, helped ensure scrums solid.
- Tony Harris: 6/10 – growing in confidence.
- Scan: 6/10 – another solid performance in the tight
- James Mc: 6/10 – sober for once and disrupted well in the first half.
- Ross: 6/10 – steady performance.
- Si: 6/10 – quieter than usual
- Gillam – 6/10 – good first half bosh but then disappeared out the game. More snaffling required.
- Macca: 7/10 – good in attack and defence.
- Dean: 5/10 – rubbish. No more Friday night stella from hereon .
- AB: 5/10 – rubbish. No more Friday night squiffiness.
- Matt Brown: 6/10 – starved of possession but looked dangerous with what little ball received.
- Rubery: 6/ - solid but starved off possession. Needs to get involved for the full 80mins.
- Drury: attackingly best performance for a while – gas slowly returning.
- Ant W: great defensive performance.
- Rich B: Another superb outing. Solid in defence and never gave up.
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