STOURBRIDGE 29 BOURNVILLE 34
REPORT BY BILLY PAGE
In what was a wonderful advert for local club rugby, Bournville and hosts Stourbridge played out a thriller that had 9 tries, red and yellow cards galore and plenty of drama. Stour played into the wind and crossed early through centre Arthur Morgan. From that point on, Bournville controlled the game through some outstanding defence and breakdown work led by the loose forward trio of Dawson, Scriven and Weaver along with halfback Ben Tibbetts. Max Craven was keeping the scoreboard ticking over at regular intervals as Bourns jumped to a 9-5 lead.
More defensive pressure from Bourns led to a Stourbridge error and the loose ball was kicked through for Tom Burrows to pounce next to the posts with Craven adding the extras and another penalty shortly after for a 19-5 lead. Comfortably in the driver’s seat, Bourns suffered a setback when the AR spotted an indiscretion at the ruck and after consulting referee Peter Caunt, Steve Handy was issued a red card. Craven struck the post with a late penalty opportunity to leave the score 19-5 at half time.
Stourbridge came out and the elements in their favour and with Bournville down to 14 men, a clear intent was to run the ball from everywhere to try and make use of the extra man. Two quick-fire tries by fullback Tim Bitrim and winger Dan Rundle were scored to reduce the deficit to 19-17 with 20 minutes to play. Bournville galvanised and a wonderful break by Sam Grimshaw followed by an even better offload saw Tom Burrows touch down in the corner. This was followed 2 minutes later by an intercept by Owen Williams who outsprinted the desperate Stourbridge defenders to go 80 metres and finish in the corner. 29-17 with 15mins left. Sam Wilson scored for the hosts under the posts which Bitrim converted, but then possibly the try of the match. Bournville had possession on halfway and Rhys Williams spotted a gap and break through the line, his offload finding Tom Burrows who sprinted in for his hat trick and a 34-24 lead. Stourbridge winger Matt Mosley then showed his pace to finish off a sweeping move to set up a grandstand finish. 34-29 with time up, the referee chose to free kick the Bournville pack and a series of Stourbridge penalties saw them drive towards the line deep into injury time. The Bournville fence held resolute and Stourbridge no8 Ciaran Moore was held up by Ben Tibbetts over the line which brought to a conclusion the pulsating contest and a first win for Bournville of the season that saw them leapfrog Stourbridge out of the relegation zone.
There were many heroes in this historic win for the club; a first ever over our local rivals, and it is hard to pick our 3,2,1 but here we go.
1; Ed Krawiecki; a fine debut from the Polish international whose physicality in both attack and defence was a constant throughout the game.
2: Tom Burrows; a hat trick and showed his true finishing quality on his 2 second half tries. Lots of quality work on the kick chase throughout and some outstanding defensive contributions.
3 and star man Ben Tibbetts; the former Stourbridge man came back to haunt his old team and delivered his best performance of the season. His kicking caused the back 3 issues and some clever breaks kept the defence guessing.
Not my View through the viewfinder
Deeply disappointed not to have been able to make this match, but there we go.
For those who don’t do Facebook, I think I will be safe in posting Bournville’s ‘2 Cam man’ Andrew McCumiskey’s link to Flickr.
Take a look HERE for a tremendous selection of photos of the day.
Sully
