AFTER competing at Burnage for more than an hour Lymm finally succumbed going down 30-13 on a plastic pitch they have never won on.
The prospect of playing on Burnage’s “plastic fantastic” harboured mixed feelings – at least Lymm knew the match would be on, but this was a surface no Lymm team has ever won. Could Lymm shake that particular monkey off their back? Well, for 65 minutes this did look possible but, with a degree of inevitability, ultimately proved to be a false hope as Burnage, in the end, came out as deserved victors.
The Lymm team for the match showed a net strengthening from that which had taken the field at Sandal the week previously – with the return of prop Brotherton and talismanic skipper Higginson being offset by the absence through injury of fly-half/centre Tom Bray and hooker and “dart thrower in-chief” Pete Allen.
Lymm had the better of the early exchanges and, at around about the 7 minute mark, following a strong break by Dave Williamson down the right flank, had an early period of sustained pressure on the Burnage line. Penalty to Lymm! “That’s 3 points in the bag”, crowed the Lymm spectators. But no, to great murmuring, the attacking scrum option was taken. Hey, what did the spectators know, as the Lymm scrum tore into their Burnage counter-parts, driving them back at a rate of knots (at least the turf didn’t cut up like it did at the Stade de France later in the day!!); Another penalty to Lymm! At least this time the spectators were nodding their approval as the points were again declined in favour of an attacking scrum. Same again except this time in the post-scrum exchanges it was Lymm who were penalised and Burnage cleared their lines. Unfortunately, this became a theme that in the relatively few periods of sustained pressure that Lymm had in the Burnage “red zone” they inevitably came away pointless.
The stalemate was broken on 12 minutes when, against the run of play, Burnage returned a speculative (should that be aimless? – Ed) kick by Lymm out of defence with purpose, speed and quick hands for their right-winger, Knight, to score in the left hand corner. Winney’s excellent conversion from wide-out compounded Lymm’s discomfort. Lymm had two great opportunities in the first half, both from long-range breaks – the first after Darbyshire collected a ball dropped in the Burnage centres and the second after a brilliant 50m plus break by Higginson which just failed to garner the required support to cross the whitewash. The further scoring in the first half was restricted to a penalty apiece – Nolan for Lymm on 25 minutes; and Winney, off the upright, for Burnage on 27.
The half-time view on the touchline was that Lymm had shaded possession and had had much the better field position, yet were 7 points down – could that be the Burnage 3G monkey be swinging from the trees opposite?
The first 25 minutes of the second half, were largely played in stalemate between the 22s with one penalty apiece (Burnage, Winney, 47; Lymm, Nolan, 49) being the only action to warm the fingers of the scoreboard operative. The Lymm penalty was the result of a huge bone jarring tackle by Giles on Hewitt the Burnage No8, which drew gasps from both sets of supporters. Throughout this period though, the sense in the Lymm following was that if only we could get a score and get our noses ahead we would be likely to come away with the points.
Then on 65 minutes a telling break by Winney caught the Lymm cover defence napping and resulted in Lawson touching down in the right hand corner. This was no more than the Burnage 7 deserved, having been a thorn in Lymm’s side all afternoon. Winney failed to convert. So at 18-6 down, Lymm played their ace card and Coach Kinsey took off his tracksuit, put his clipboard down and joined the frey. It did not go unnoticed to the Lymm spectators that at this point fly half Knowles took a couple of large steps towards his scrum-half…….
Stung by this try and the barking of Coach Kinsey being that much closer, Lymm stepped up a gear and got some rhythm back into their play. Hard yards were made and the gain line consistently broken – however, the problem that Lymm had been encountering all afternoon (and seemed incapable of solving) was that they were going too high into contact; Burnage are a strong savvy pack and on far too many occasions held the Lymm attacker up to win the decision of the referee and the turnover. Far too often this disrupted encouraging Lymm momentum.
On 70 minutes, Lymm had a very promising field position – an attacking 5m line-out; the catch, drive, rumble, score looked a cert. However, within the blink of an eye, Burnage had an attacking scrum 5m from the Lymm line – wrong options and errors combining in the cruellest way. The inevitable result was a try (73 minutes) in the left corner for Burnage wing Oldham, again converted by Winney. 25-6 down, Burnage’s tails up and, remarkably, in the hunt for a bonus point.
Lymm came right back with a try by Widdrington (78) in the left hand corner – this time the catch, drive, rumble, score delivered the points – which Nolan, showing he could match Winney’s boot, converted magnificently with the minimum of fuss. 25-13 and now it was Lymm who could sniff the bonus point.
The final two minutes and beyond (as the last play lasted an age) was dominated by the lure of the bonus point as both sides refused to kick the ball off the field and started to play higher risk rugby. In the end, it was Lymm who took one risk too many and a dropped ball in midfield was snapped up by Burnage, resulting in Oldham scoring his second (83 minutes) in the left hand corner. This time Winney failed to convert. Final score 30-13.
From Lymm’s perspective the positive was their resolute up-close defence where Oakes and Giles were outstanding. With Kendal and Billingham next up, both at Crouchley Lane, there is a great opportunity for Lymm to reverse this disappointing result.
