Under 13's Narrow Defeat to Plate Winners

Having travelled down to Hadleigh, this years Suffolk Plate Winners, with only 14 players (10 Forwards)this was always going to be a tough morning for the young men in black & gold, but with the new belief/confidence in their ability, Southwold were not about to lay down and surrender easily!
After a little shuffling of positions and the loan of Brandon, Wold were ready for the start, immediately taking the game to their hosts. A Pick up and go from No:8 Merlin made great inroads into the Hadleigh half, this was followed by great pressure which had Hadleigh defending frantically. A stray pass out wide not going to hand resulted in a break out by the Hadleigh winger who was caught by a fantastic last ditch tackle by Brandon 5 Metres out. Hadleigh then applied some pressure of their own and tested the Southwold defence fully, a defensive hand in a ruck finally giving away a penalty inside Wolds 22. A quick tap & go by the Hadleigh Scrum Half caught the Wold defence napping and the 1st Try & Conversion was scored.
The following 10 minutes of the game was an even affair with any Hadleigh attack being quickly snuffed out with some great tackling most notably Jacob, Luke, Hugo and Reece leaving Hadleigh attackers in no doubt they were not going to pass!!
Hadleigh slowly began to dominate territory using the wind to their advantage and some great kicking pegging Southwold back into their half for long periods of play, Wolds defence finally cracked allowing Hadleigh to score in the corner just before half time. 12-nil
Following some verbal encouragement from the coaches and Captain at half time wold came out of the blocks in the 2nd half possitively, The Front Row ( Jarvis,Olly & Matt) continued to dominate at the scrummage & with Sam continuing to find gaps at scrum half Southwold began to make their presence felt, good breaks from New boys Max, Reece and Kieran kept Southwold in the game, Hadleigh again broke out following Southwold pressure and after a few phases scored in the corner again (despite desperate efforts to hold up) 17-nil.
With heads held high Southwold responded immediately by camping out in Hadleighs half, breaks from Brandon,Merlin and Sam had the Hadleigh defence creaking.Scrum Half Sam scrabbled accross and touched down over the Hadleigh line, only to be adjudged as using 2 movements by the referee. Undeterred by this Wold pressured the subsequent Hadleigh scrum and turned the ball over, quick hands moved the ball out to Harry FF and he smashed his way over the try line.The conversion from out wide by Harry M brushed the post 17-5. The final 10 minutes were played out evenly, Hadleigh used their 3 subs (apologies accepted).
A brave, positive performance by all, with 3 players only playing their 2nd game of rugby, Thanks to Olly for stepping into Hook and George for playing Fly Half both for the 1st time
Wolds Man of The Match : Merlin