Match report by Paul Gibson
Under leaded skies and swirling wind and rain Crawley blues arrived at Hastings and Bexhill Rugby Club for their second Blues fixture.
A long journey contributed to a slow start by our boys and the home sided made the most of our stuttering start and although the rain had stopped before the start the wind was blustering across the open fields.
H&B had the better possession and relied on some penetrating runs by their forwards to make inroads into the Blues half and soon we found ourselves two tries down. H&B scored a third from a mazey run from their winger and a 4th from a wide out run from one of their bigger forwards and The Blues were looking flat. A big kick by Fred from the restart allowed Hayden to chase down their left winger and win a penalty for not releasing which was quickly taken and passed to Mitchell who ran in a great try in the opposite corner. Although we conceded a further 2 tries before half time there was a sense that Crawley were starting to come back…
The second half began with Crawley Blues on the front foot playing with confidence and spirit which earned them a penalty close to the H&B try line which was tapped and passed to Freddy to crash over the line in the first of our 5 second half tries. Some great try line defending saw Mitch turn and kick the ball away tight against our line a good 20 meters into the opposition half. Ethan continued to hook almost every ball, ours or theirs with reliable regularity which gave us great possession and Oscar made the most of it. The pace of Carlos and Hayden on the wings restricted the H&B attacks in the channels and the ever reliable Nate at full-back caught and returned kicked balls making more ground. Tommy or ‘Fun Bus’ as the lads now know him made several driving runs and fierce tackling and strong rucking kept us in good field position which was turned into tries. Two tries from Fran from the scrum half position and Mitch’s second of the afternoon and we were chasing down the deficit with Carlos coming close on a couple of occasions. Continuing and enduring graft by Asa, Enzo, Ethan and Daniel helped us retain the ball and hard running by Oscar kept the pressure on H&B. Try of the afternoon was scored by Hayden in the right hand corner while chasing down a great kick from Mitch to add a debut try to his two assists.
Although H&B did score two second half tries the irrepressible spirit and grit of the Crawley Blues was most impressive coming back from where they were at half time – well done everyone!
Final score Hastings and Bexhill U12s Dev 40 – Crawley Blues 30
Crawley Try scorers: Freddy, Mitchell (2), Fran (2) and Hayden