Bromsgrove RFC 20 Sutton 19
BROMSGROVE got their campaign in the Midlands Division Two West off to a flying start with a hard fought win over Sutton Coldfield on Saturday at Finstall Park.
Having lost the first league game of the season for the last three years, Bromsgrove skipper Richard Arnold was determined to break the mould.
With some hard pre-season work behind them and a fit squad to choose from the Boars were confident.
Sutton Coldfield had other ideas and quickly opened up their try count in the first few minutes, assisted by some sloppy defence from Bromsgrove.
Town then countered and started to dominate possession, however Sutton’s defence was resolute.
From within their own 22 Sutton’s speedy winger broke through and then stepped inside countless flailing tackles to score a superb individual try under the posts to see the home side trailing by 12-0.
But they fought back from the kick-off and Nigel Burrows broke from the scrum but failed to link with the threequarters.
Burrows was again involved when fly-half Ben Copson broke and fed the ball inside.
When stopped, Arnold guided the driven maul from 20-yards out to score a deserved try, before Copson narrowly missed the conversion.
Copson’s accurate kicking was giving Bromsgrove a way back into the game and his penalty ensured they pulled themselves within four points of their opponents by half-time.
The hosts started the second half aggressively and mounted pressure onto the Sutton defence.
A deep clearance kick from the visitors failed to reach touch and Richard Stockholm picked it up and linked well with Dan Ingram.
Ingram broke a couple of tackles but when stopped remained strong in the tackle, allowing his support players time to set up a ruck.
Having stretched Sutton Coldfield the ball was then shipped to Burrows in the centre of the park, who powered through the defence and ran in a superb try under the posts. Copson converted to put Bromsgrove 15-12 ahead.
Having gained the ascendancy Town inexplicably lost it through a mixture of back chat to the referee and poor discipline, leading to a yellow card for replacement prop Andy Fellows and numerous penalties.
Sutton punished one of these when they attacked quickly and set up their number eight for a driving run down the left flank.
Eventually the ball was carried over for a try and a tough conversion was slotted taking the score to 19-15 to the visitors.
Bromsgrove countered with effort but at times lacked the finesse to slice open the visiting team.
To the home team’s credit they did not give up and with a few minutes to go set up a scrum on the edge of Sutton’s 22.
Burrows drove from the back and linked with Tom Solomon on the wing.
The ball was then driven on by Dan Quinn, who broke through the defence and was stopped just short of the line.
Arnold took the ball and drove over for his second try and despite the conversion being missed, they held on for a vital opening day win.
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