DIXONIANS 14 - 21 HEREFORD
18 January 2003
Powergen Midlands 2 West League
Hereford continued to
put the pressure on their promotion rivals with second away win in a row and
now look forward to entertaining league leaders Laurentians next week and 2nd
place Derby the week after, both at home.
The final score of Dixonians 14 Hereford 21 never really reflected the dominance that Hereford achieved over the full 80 minutes, apart from a 10 minute spell, and players and supporters were left wondering how Hereford had ever lost at home to this side back in October.
Hereford set off at a brisk pace and spent the first 15 minutes camped inside the home 22 yard line. Some good ball won then and throughout the game won by lock Phil (Sodgey) Jones, returning from an 18 month sabbatical, set up waves of attacks. Des White went close on two occasions, as did Richard Mayson. However Hereford returned to their own half with only 3 points from a Colin Osborne penalty given for offside. There then followed a strange 10-minute passage of play where Hereford completely outplayed themselves, losing set scrums, lineouts and loose ball. Firstly centre Webb was allowed to cut through the defence and score a try, which was converted by Best. Following the kick off Dixonians completely dominated the visiting forwards and several forward runs allowed winger Anthony Neville-Davies to go over in the corner. Once again Best converted. This made the score 14-03 and the visitors realised that only hard work and the taking of at least some of their chances would result in a win.
The forwards came back into the game with some outstanding performances by Matthew Pritchard and Will McQuaid. Pritchard was at the heart of everything and constantly set up attacks or thwarted the opposition. Dixonians only real move was to work South African No 8, Strangewood off the back off the scrum but McQuaid constantly brought the big man down before he could make headway or set up the Dixonians backs for a run.
After 30 minutes following some good play by Johnson and his forwards, Grisman and Griffiths used a switch move to set up good clean ball and from the ensuing ruck, swift handling from Jenkins, Preece and Osborne sent Des White away to force his way over the line. With Osborne missing the kick it made the score 14-8.
From the kick off Hereford forced the home team onto the back foot and a move between forward and backs, with Pritchard and McQuaid once again in the thick of it, sent Gary Preece away for a well deserved try. Fly half Preece was returning after a 3-month injury and slotted back in the side, with Scrum half Ben Jenkins also returning, as though they had played all season together.
At the turn around the score was then 14-13, but Hereford new that it should be a matter of time before they would take the lead and turn their superiority into points.
The second half started much the same as the first with Hereford on the attack. In total the backs probably had six or seven chances where they had set up the runners and just the final pass wasn’t given or went astray. Dixonians held out for a full 20 minutes with Osborne missing 5 penalties’ that should have given Hereford the lead. Finally he was successful and Hereford took the lead 14-16.
Dixonians were constantly penalised by the East Midland referee for persistent offside and indeed 2 yellow cards were issued for the same offences. From these penalty’s Ben Jenkins was always alert, looking very much like his old self, and made ground from virtually all of them.
Now looking to finish off the opposition Hereford thwarted the few attacks that Dixonians could muster and finally sealed the home teams fate when Ben Jenkins dashed over from a ruck set up by Pritchard and McQuaid and well won by Ben Hillstead and Dave Thomas.
Osborne once again failed to convert a difficult kick but the 7-point lead was enough.
Chairman Guy Griffiths said, “the way we started I thought it was going to be a one horse race but Dixonians kept in there and forced us to work hard for the victory. We are aware that we are not finishing off our chances as well as we should do but it’s another win and another important step in the right direction. When you consider that at any one time in the game we had 11 players that are 24 years of age and younger, you will see how the Club has progressed. With the invaluable help of the older few, the club is coming together much quicker than any of us expected. It was good to have “Sodgey” back with us, who made a positive difference to our forwards. Interestingly enough, half of the team had not been in the same side as him before. We look forward to Laurentians coming to Hereford next week followed by Derby the following week. This will be our sternest test of the season so far. The players know that these games are important to them and the results of these two will very much influence who goes up at the end of the season. Derby & Laurentians should have played each other this week but Derby had an Intermediate Cup match, after beating Luctonians in the previous round.”