Camborne away pre season friendly

Cambourne RFC 7 – 39 BSRFC Abbotts

17 mighty Abbott’s descended on Cambourne for the first pre-season friendly... only once we’d realised we weren’t playing Camborne in the south west!

Warm up probably wasn’t the most enthusiastic in true Abbott style, especially when you could see Cambourne were really up for this one with tackle bags out. Either way, we cracked on and the game begun.

The game started off as it did last year with Cairnsey under the ball from the kick off, taking the hit before offloading to Optimus who crashed the ball up field. The Abbotts started off on a strong foot pushing the ball up field until Jimmy found an opening down on the wing to run the ball in under the posts. A great start that continued for much of the second half

It wasn’t long before we were back on the score board following a pass out wide from Haslam that was run up to the halfway line by Nick Clayton who managed to actually pass the ball for a change just before being tackled by their 15. Jake Borough was on hand with a brilliant support run to collect the ball to get another under the posts taking the score to 0-14.

Cambourne got close to the line on a couple of occasions but owing to a strong defensive line from the Abbotts saw the ball turn over on both occasions.

Fast forward 10 minutes of middle field action and we were back over the line, this time a loose ball from the opposition found the boot of Cairnsey who kicked the ball downfield, and driving on the ball in the try area to take the score to 0-19. Cainsey then went on to tell everyone who would listen and even those who would about it for the rest of the day. By the end it had increased to a 50 meter try.

The last 10 minutes saw more swinging arms and scraps than actual rugby as the opposition struggled to deal with the Abbotts physicality in defence, after the 4th or 5th scuffle normally with Charlie Harris at the bottom or close to it leading by example as any good captain should the ref decided to call half time.

The Abbotts came out a little slower in the second half but defensively remained on point with the opposition rarely threatening our line apart from one moment where in truth we probably fell asleep allowing their outside centre to crash over the line.

This gave the Abbotts a wakeup call that saw us response straight away at the other end of the pitch, with space left open on the wing Jake ran over the line in the corner taking the score to 7-24.

The remaining tries came from Nick Clayton running up through the middle, Jimmy getting another in the corner with some magical foot work and Michael Reynolds picking up a try at the final whistle following a great solo run by Alex Fairclough (more on that later)!

There were a number of candidates for man of the match, notably (but at no surprise) Stuart Haslam was well up there providing plenty of experience amongst the backs, Jake Borough for his brace of tries however, it came down to two men. George MG and Jimmy Salmon, the former showing his ability to play absolutely any position on the field, covering prop, outside centre, wing and finally scrum half! However.... it is Jimmy, who after 15 years decided to stick the boots back on for a run out scoring 2 tries in the process and being on the end of every pass out wide. Round of applause for Jimmy!

As with MoM the were a number of contenders for DotD, Charlie Harris... well just because he is Charlie and disagreeing with the ref for the whole game, Jay for telling us all he couldn’t play, only to nick someone’s boots and come on during the second half. Micky Reynolds for a chip through past the last man and instead of just dotting it down knocks it on. DotD however goes to a lad who has the pace to outrun most on a rugby pitch, as we thought he would demonstrate during the final play of the game, running the ball halfway down the pitch with only one defender to beat (could have done him easily!) but decides to change direction, run into him and crack two ribs in the process. His only saving grace was setting up Michael’s try in the process! Alex Fairclough, take a bow.

Next week sees the Abbotts away at Harlow. If you are free please come down and support the lads!

Team Sheet:

1 Maz
2 Sam Watts
3 Josh Prime
4 Slade
5 Cairnsey
6 Jesus
7 John Carter
8 Charlie Harris

9 Alex Fairclough
10 Stuart Haslam
11 George MG (also played 1,13 & 9)
12 Nick Clayton
13 Jake Borough
14 Jimmy Salmon
15 Rod Tankard

16 Rickie
17 Mickey Reynolds
18 Jay Hunt (kind of)