Extra A 35 v Hertford 3s 17

The Extra A traveled to local rivals Hertford on Saturday for their final friendly before the start of the league campaign next week. Conditions were ideal for running Rugby, and, despite a muddled morning getting our team together, we boasted another strong starting lineup.

Stortford kicked off and our pack immediately showed their aggression and commitment at the breakdown, with Extra A debutante Jamie Gage particularly shining in this area. This led to lots of possession in the opening minutes, but handling errors and general rustiness cost us; although we managed to find plenty of space were unable to covert this into anything meaningful. At the 15 minute mark though, things started to click a bit more and some brilliant interplay from Walsh, Baker and Harrison led to the latter feeding veteran David Rose to score the opening try of the match. It took only two minutes for the Extra A to strike again; a penalty straight from the kick off was awarded and Gage tapped quickly and put Sperm in a gap (intended), the fly half rounded the full back and scored under the posts, converting his own score for a 14-0 lead on the 20 minute mark. The second quarter of the match was not a pretty affair, and, although there were some further strong line breaks from Walsh, Roche and the very special Stig dog, we were unable to score again before half time. We did actually cross the line twice, but more on this later.

The second half started more brightly for the Blues, the wind was used to good effect and some good line-out work from our pack saw us on the front foot in the opposition 22. After several close range attempts we were awarded a penalty, quickly taken by the opportunistic Alex Walsh who darted over unopposed for his first try of the day; extras added. Our defensive standard seemed to slip slightly following this, our indiscipline coupled with some direct Hertford running saw them score an unconverted try. We did hit back immediately though, after pinning them in their 22 once again hooker Will Moore capitalised on a Hertford line-out mistake to go close himself, before Walsh once again showed his strength to dart over from close range for another 7 pointer. The game broke up a bit after this, and despite a massive hit from Macfie in our 22, Hertford scored again from close range after a quick tap penalty which was taken 2 meters from our line; the referee deemed this to be Ok and they managed to crash over. Order was restored soon after this though, when Sperm picked up a bouncing ball from an under pressure Walsh pass on the half way line and managed to dance his way through a tiring defence and (just) out run the chasers to score out wide. Hertford had the last laugh though, after a Stortford mix up in the opposing 22 their winger picked up the ball and broke clear, only to be hauled down 5 meters short of the line by Sperm (yes I'm mentioning it; longest 15 seconds of my life). Unfortunately this effort was in vein, as they managed to burrow their way over a couple of phases later. With only a minute to play this was the last meaningful act of the day, which saw the final score at 35-17.

All in all this was not the most convincing Extra A performance, but there were many positives and some moments of magic too. Also, a win against Hertford at any level is not to be sniffed at.
Man of the match was a straight forward decision; d*ck of the day regular Alex Walsh shone all game and caused havoc for the Hertford defence, rightfully earning his pint. D*ck of the day was awarded to two players this week for the same offence. Joe Tracy, after a superb carry from the back of a scrum, got over the line, only to drop the ball whilst attempting to score. Ben 'the saint' Baker did exactly the same about 3 minutes later.

All in all a good day for the Extra A, giving us some momentum to take into our first league match against Tring 2s next week.