Ducks go down fighting


The men of Ostler’s Field welcomed their South West 2 rivals Swanage & Wareham on Saturday. Given that the home side once again were fielding virtually a second team, this was a game that was always going to be tough.

The early exchanges were mainly played out in the centre of the pitch with neither side gaining the upper hand, this was mainly due to better communication from the home side in the forwards, they more than matched there south west rivals, but the referee began to blow his whistle too many times for the home supporters liking and this gave the visitors an opportunity to get on the scoreboard with a well struck penalty. Further penalties meant that Swanage were able to pin the home side back and it they duly took the lead after they created an overlap out wide, with the score being converted it gave them a healthy 12-0 lead, they further extend this lead with a penalty.

This seemed to spur the home side into action and after a good break by Fijan Max, they managed to score a great try from flying winger Liam D’almeida. This brought the score to 15-5 and they were truly back in the game, but with a backs to the wall effort to keep the score that way until half-time, they just couldn’t hold out and Swanage managed to score another converted try to take the score to 22-5 at half- time, meaning that the Ducks were up against it after the break.

With the next score being crucial to the outcome of the game, it was the visitors who managed to stretch their lead with a penalty, the home side had a true uphill battle to gain parity with Swanage, they did continue to fight and managed to score again through winger D’almeida

But the visitors stretched their lead further with a penalty and a converted try, the duck again fought back and it was down to big No. 8 windy Miller to finish off a flowing move to bring the Ducks a bit of respectability, this was tarnished a little when the referee decided to award an extremely hash penalty try, the ruling was extremely hard on the home side as it has to be beyond doubt that a score would have come, anyway, this was converted to make the final score 39-17.

Although this looks like the Ducks were well beaten, the endeavour of the back row and scrum half meant that there were positives to work on at training this week. With coach/captain and chairman of rugby building a team for the visit to Redingensians in a fortnight it is hoped that the Ducks can be back to near full strength.

Post edited by: deano, at: 2006/11/15 18:10