Burton 29 Eccleshall 7 on   Feb 24th 2008

This weekend Burton u15s Cougars hosted Eccleshall on the Ox- Hay.   The teams last met in a County league fixture in early November, however with this being a friendly game Eccleshall boosted their ranks by mixing in some under 16s players .  Surprisingly, (or not...) the previous fixture between the 2 sides was the last game that the Cougars had hosted on the Ox-hay.  Finally recovered from the recent flooding, the ground was soft with some areas of mud on the pitch.

The game started scrappily from a Burton kick off, both sides struggled to find their feet in the opening minutes.  The Cougars gradually began to gain control with hard work from the forwards leading to positive attacking opportunities.   The efforts paid off, Reece Collier finished an attacking flourish with his first try of the game.  Unfortunately, the Cougars were caught napping at the restart; a knock on advantage for the visitors was swiftly converted into 7 points when they continued play and ran through for a converted try with little resistance. 

Burton Cougars took note of the situation and resolved to give their opposition the respect they duly deserved.  Digging deep, the Cougars forged ahead with the game plan that had worked so well for them previously.  Steve McRobbie put the finishing touch to some fine attacking forward play for another unconverted try which saw the young ‘Crofters finish the first half with a 10 – 7 lead.

The Cougars began the second half knowing that they could keep the upper hand if they did not let their game slip.  Defending well and using their forward platform to attack, the Cougars steadily developed their game to the point where the visiting side could no longer keep up.  The first try of the second half came through Matty Davies who relished in finishing the efforts of the pack.  Tom Cooper provided the extra points with his conversion.  Burton Cougars remained on top for the duration of the game. 

The only times that Eccleshall came deep into the Cougars’ territory were due to penalties given against them for spending a little too much time and effort trying to “enlighten” the match official.  Holding their discipline and keeping their mouths firmly shut, the Cougars put in the graft to see them clear.  Reece Collier crossed the whitewash from a penalty before claiming his hat trick from another superb attacking platform provided by the pack.  Tom Cooper added the conversion once again to finish the game 29 – 7 in the Cougars’ favour.

This was a well deserved win for the Cougars, made sweeter by the way that the team pulled together and made their way up-field through the forwards before releasing the backs.  On several occasions the visitors were stunned by the blistering paste of Paddy Gaunt on the wing and beaten into submission by the work of the Burton pack, especially Jack Mclaughlin and Zac “Nobby” Furner in the front row and Will Harrison and Steve Boden on the flanks.   Today’s valuable lessons learnt were the need to play to the officials decisions and keep emotions to a minimum.