Broadstreet fade badly as streetwise Longton disrupt and then get it together.

After a four match winning streak and a convincing performance against Mansfield RFC the previous weekend, Broadstreet welcomed Longton RFC, one of the league’s form sides, confident that a win could be on the cards.  The visitors were genuine promotion contenders last season but were pipped to the posts by a late surge from Sheffield Tigers RFC that confined the Staffordshire club to another year of National 3 rugby.  After losing, arguably, the league’s best player in Gareth Rawlings to National 1’s Fylde RFC in the summer, Longton had a slow start to the 2011/12 campaign, but after steadying the ship are now finding some of last season’s top form writes Luke Truslove.

Broadstreet once more made a few changes to their line-up with an injury to Todd Freemantle meaning last week’s MotM Luke Veeble moved to Outside Centre and Andy Funnell taking his place on the Wing.  Matt Dearden replaced Liam McCrea at Tighthead and the return of Stewart Hendry at Number 8 meant that Eddie Simkiss went back into the Second Row with Nick Pratt, still regaining match fitness after two months out, dropping into the 2nd XV.  Full Back Scott Harman was rested for the first time this season after playing three games in four days (League, Warwickshire Cup and Warwickshire U20s) so there was a welcome return to 1st XV rugby for Jamie Dodd.  After missing six games, Club Captain Nick Thatcher came onto the bench, now fully recovered from his MCL injury and was joined by university student Rory Lillington making his 1st XV league debut.

TEAM: Beales, Dawes, Dearden, Simkiss, Greevy, C Dodd, Zutic, Hendry, Simpson, Richards, Funnell, Challis, Veeble, Bicknell, J Dodd.  SUBS: Roff, Thatcher, Lillington.

Broadstreet got off to a flying start when a long kick from Longton was fielded and returned with interest by Luke Veeble, sliding through the defensive line with a neat sidestep he followed it up with a seventy metre sprint for the line. Unfortunately for Veeble what would have been an excellent individual effort was halted, for about the fifth time in 2012, just inches from the opposition Try Line.  However Broadstreet were there in numbers and a quick turnover was fed to Eddie ‘Slow-Mo’ Simkiss, who collected the ball five metres from the line and attempted a sidestep that can only be likened to a slow ball in cricket.

Longton's defender, expecting the play to continue in actual speed, continued to push wide anticipating the on-coming attacker.  However, Simkiss’s unique ability to remove all pace from an attacking play meant that the gap opened as the Longton player in front of him continued to defend the running line of a normal-paced person.  So, with the now famous ‘Slow-Mo’ Simkiss Sidestep, Eddie managed to amble through the gap to lower himself to the ground to score after only one minute.  Unfortunately Danny Richards was not able to endorse the effort with a conversion.  5-0 

Uncharacteristically for Broadstreet they followed up this Try with a safe catch and another period of sustained attack, looking composed and patching together a number of decent phases, ‘Street actually began to look like a well balanced side. On ten minutes Broadstreet were once more threatening to score but a professional foul by Longton Fly Half Scott Rawlings, prevented a Broadstreet Try, but did earn himself ten minutes in the Sin Bin.

Nevertheless, Broadstreet continued in the same vein and after a number of phases following a Five Metre Scrum, Stewart Hendry took a pass from Scrum Half Jordan Simpson and managed to crash through a couple of would-be-defenders to score his fifth Try of the season. This time Richards had no problem adding the kick.  12-0

Much more characteristically Broadstreet completely messed up the resulting restart and handed the ball to Longton in dangerous territory.  Obviously on a high from the opening passages of good attacking play, Street completely lost any physicality in defence and Fijian Hendry Vaka made light work out of three or four Broadstreet attempted tackles before feeding Winger Alex George for Longton’s first Try.  Hendry Vaka rubbed salt in the wounds with a well struck conversion.  12-7

Not long afterwards, Danny Richards stepped up to comfortably slot a 40 metre Penalty to increase the margin thus maintaining Broadstreet’s momentum with just twenty minutes played.  However, this was quickly undone when Broadstreet lost in-form Flanker Chris Dodd to injury and Ben ‘large gravitational pull’ Dawes who was judged to have checked Longton Full Back Pete Clifton as he began to chase his own Up 'n’ Under, forcing the Front Rower into the Sin Bin for ten minutes.  15-7

On 32 minutes Broadstreet managed to achieve a period of Forward dominance when Dawes’ return to the pitch coincided with the Sin-Binning of Longton Prop Matt Davies for a cheeky dig after a Scrum.  Street should have made more of this opportunity in the remaining eight minutes of the Half, however their previous phase play was nowhere near as effective and the long protracted injuries of replacement Prop Tim Wareham cutely wound down the clock and sapped all energy and rhythm out of the game for the short time he was on.  This was compounded when Broadstreet lost Scrum Half Jordan Simpson to a head injury caused by a bad high tackle that went unnoticed by the referee.

HT - 15-7.  A positive Half for Broadstreet in which they would have gone in with a larger lead but for some clever antics from Longton's experienced old guard.

Shortly after the restart Broadstreet lost their second Scrum Half when Nick Thatcher suffered a nasty black eye after catching a heel in an attempted tackle.  Fly Half Dan Richards also suffered a heavy knock but was not able to come off and ended up being pushed out wide for a large proportion of the Second Half.  Due to a bit of a gamble with two Backs amongst the Replacements, Broadstreet had to have a positional re-jig that unfortunately didn’t have a greatly positive effect on Broadstreet’s patterns of play.

Scott Rawlings closed the gap with a Penalty but Longton themselves began to suffer a number of their own setbacks to their squad.  Captain Craig Wilson suffered an injury and both Longton and Broadstreet incurred another Sin Binning each for issues at the breakdown.  What this meant was that a game full of First Half promise was reduced to a scrappy affair which didn’t do either team any justice. 15-10

As a squad Longton are comfortably the biggest side in the league and when the game lost its shape with the wholesale changes to each side, it was the powerful running of the Longton Backs that began to control proceedings.  Centre Hendry Vaka and Fly Half Rawlings were easily breaking the first line of defence and despite leading, Broadstreet were no longer bringing any physicality or passion to the match.  It was no surprise then, when Longton scored three quick Tries in succession.

Firstly, Flanker Ben Grocott latched onto a loose Lineout throw to score with ease.  Then influential Centre Vaka scored a well deserved Try when he powerfully jinked through the defensive cover after Rawlings had released him.  Trailing by five points with just fifteen minutes to go, Broadstreet conceded a most disappointing Try.  After being awarded a Penalty five metres or so from the Broadstreet Line, Fly Half Rawlings wandered up to the ball and without even hinting at kicking for touch, tapped the ball and charged at the amassed Forwards in front of him and unfortunately for Broadstreet, not one of them could honestly say they gave a good account of themselves in the tackle and Rawlings all too easily scored their Bonus Point Try. 15-25

FT – 15-25.  After a promising First Half, Broadstreet suffered a lot of changes that disrupted the team's momentum.  However, it was the manner of the capitulation which is most upsetting for the Broadstreet faithful.  A tough trip to Scunthorpe next week will hopefully provide ample opportunity for the players to earn back some pride.

MotM – Answers on a postcard.

DotD – Nick Thatcher’s much anticipated comeback.... subsequently turned out to be a contribution to maintaining the Dug Out’s friendly atmosphere for a fair amount of the Second Half.

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