Paviors RFC

Last weekend, Pavs jumped on The Magic Bus and made the trip to the West Midlands to play Walsall RFC. Recent fixtures have been close affairs with Walsall taking the points on the last two occasions. Pavs continue to rebuild with very recent Academy products, Cole Mangham, Nick Smith, Finn Moran and Kyle Burney given further opportunities as well as a debut for new signing and scrum half Ben White. 

From the kick off, Pavs got off to a great start, moving the ball swiftly to the width and dominating play in the early minutes. Unfortunately, flanker Nick Smith suffered a dead leg early on and was replaced by fellow talented youngster Kyle Burney. Despite the pressure, Pavs did not make the most of their opportunities and as these things always go, it was Walsall who opened the scoring after they made the best use of a dropped ball by Pavs to get to the width and score in the corner, so 7-0 on eight minutes. Twelve  minutes in, the home side again made good use of a Pavs error to go further in front at 14-0, probably  against the run of the play. Pavs stuck at it and were rewarded by a try on fourteen minutes which was a collective effort from the boys upfront so 14-5. The theme of Pavs errors supplying Walsall with opportunities was again to the fore on twenty one minutes as Pavs slipped further behind at 21-5. Entering the final third of the half the extremely speedy centre, Dan Stokes, m outpaced the Walsall defence and brought proceedings to 21-10. On thirty seven minutes, the unfortunate Stokes was forced off with a calf injury to be replaced by Luke Snowden. To end the half, Pavs gave up a penalty which the almost faultless Walsall kicker converted to take the score to 24-10 at the break.

Into the second half. Walsall continued to pounce on Pavs errors as the away side set about redressing the gap in the score. Their first try on forty minutes put them further in front 29-10 and another score extended the score to 36-10 on fifty eight minutes. At this point Pavs began to get back into the game with lock Sam Bradley making a break and narrowing matters to 36-15. As Pavs continued to attack and move the ball through the hands , they coughed up another loose ball which Walsall again scored from to take them 43-15 with seventeen minutes left. If Pavs had played with an open style early on, they doubled down and made even further efforts to find the width. Phil Eggleshaw finished off a fine move to bring the score to 43-20 on seventy minutes. Wing Cole Manghan added another try on seventy seven minutes to take the final score to 43-25. 

So a weird kind of day for Pavs. Lots of good stuff and ambitious play , in the tight and out in the backs, but persistent errors proved to be their undoing. The relationship between the two sides was actually very close and one wonders what the score could have been had there been just fewer mistakes. Pavs will be happy with the bonus point they took away, but it could have been so much better.  

Next weekend, Pavs travel to West Bridgford in round 6 of the Regional Midlands North 2 competition.

Forward of The Match - Sam Bradley

Back of The Match - Dan Stokes

Youngster of The Match - Finn Moran