Ripon win an open game as Winter has a field day

Ripon bravely travelled to Leos with just 9 players as the curse of higher teams taking players and international day struck once more. After Neil, fresh from his 3 week Honeymoon / World tour, and Cadgey had done some evening up an open 13 ish a side game kicked off in wintery sunshine.

The game was to be played at a frantic pace with no back rows so there was more space than normal for the respective 10s. Jonny for Ripon directed his backs well and the evergreen Bindloss was his normal enthusiastic and noisy self in setting his outside men free at every opportunity.

Up front the scrums were of the crouch bind cuddle variety, the unopposed nature of them meant both sets of forwards had plenty of energy for joining every breakdown. Simon was sent skywards in the lineout and took some great ball as a result. Neils friend from the North East clearly played a few levels above Leos and stood out as both a destructive ball carrier and solid defender. Cadgey rumbled well making hard yards as did Stu Norton who is a real handful when his dander is up. Stu crashed through tackles in the back field with glee.

However one man was to take the game by the scruff of the neck and show his class. Every time Mark Winter took the ball something happened. Mark is electric, not only quick but with the rugby intelligence to compliment his physical gifts. This was most clearly shown when after a 40 yard break he was nearing the try line, somehow a defender got back to slow him down, he simply looked up and threw a 20 yard pass to a supporting player who passed to another and a quite superb try was thus scored. He is also a tough little nugget as after he was floored by a high tackle he simply got up with the minimum of fuss as the offender apologised.

Despite your humble scribe pointing out it was the height of rudeness to repeatedly step 44 year old people ! Mark had “ one of those games “

The Ripon boys were committed and one of them caught an interception running ¾ of the length of the field to dot down under the posts. A great effort. Nick at 9 gave good service to Jonny and an even game developed with some further swapping of players. Farmer Jim was his resolute self managing to stop , pick up Stu and drive him backwards, no mean feat as Stu was at full tilt at the point of initial contact. Said Stu impressively stopped Cadgey in his tracks and not many do that !

Both teams scored good tries and at half time I have no idea who was winning !

The second stanza was a mirror of the first as even more space opened up as people tired. Bindloss kicked well, one punt spiralling a full 60 yards to the far touch line and a couple of restarts were landed on a sixpence. Carl ran hard at 8 and even passed the ball, the fumbling centre who had called for it managed to drop the pass to groans all round ! He also danced down a touchline and threw what was called a thing of beauty in the form of another pass. Some wag was heard to chelp “ And we don’t say that about Carl very often do we ? “ Rob was somehow help up when it looked easier to score, still no idea how he did not actually score the try !

Howler heckled in a good natured way from the sideline threatening to sub a centre off, his banter is all we get these days as sadly he can no longer play. Mark continued to score tries for fun ending up with a think 5 in total, 3 for one team and 2 for the other. His omission from the 1s remains something of a mystery. The Ref kept the game flowing well and kept a light hand on the tiller. Penalties were fairly rare and a thoroughly enjoyable game was played out.

As ever with Ripon the game was played in very good spirits and we remain grateful that they chose to travel with just 9 men who wanted to play rugby.

I have no idea of the final score but Ripon won by around 8 points.

We retired in nervous anticipation of what was to come watching England. Leos remains a friendly family orientated club and as we watched Scotland take on the Boks people enjoyed the excellent fodder Tony always provides. Our 1s lost to Ripon but we were all in good spirits as we enjoyed a few cold beers.