Tottonians 14 v Wimbledon RFC 1XV 18
Wimbledon's journey to the west of Southampton on Saturday (November 12) was rewarded with victory, but in the event it was a close-run thing.
So far this season Tottonians had not enjoyed the best of starts but on the day gave a spirited and determined performance that could have earned them victory in injury time at the end of the match. Wimbledon dominated the match for long periods in both territory and possession and scored two tries through Morgan and Rees.
Wimbledon started steadily and when a break from centre David Rees led to wing Dave Charles getting to within 5m of the Tottonians line, shortly after this Tottonians gained a penalty after Wimbledon failed to release in the tackle, their scrum half Bryn Marshall made no mistake and shortly after this they conceded one after pushing too early in the scrum, this time Wimbledon’s wing Leon Driscoll scored from 30m.
Shortly afterwards on 23 minutes a break from him led to scrum half Charlie Morgan cutting back inside and scoring near the posts, the conversion was made and Wimbledon were 10 – 3 ahead.
Marshall replied with a penalty and a few minutes later another attempt was missed after striking the posts, Wimbledon made another attack and put the ball through many hands from left to right before Rees was able to score, but the conversion kick was unsuccessful.
Wimbledon's backs opened up the defence once again and only a forward pass to Dave Charles denied them a try. A third penalty from Marshall kept Tottonians in touch at half time 9 – 15.
Clearly the home team’s half time talk had an effect as a huge forward drive from their pack led to second row Ali Ramus scoring in their right hand corner, Marshall could not make the conversion but the gap was now just one point. Having said that Wimbledon continued to enjoy both possession and territory and this paid off when a Tottonians replacement received a yellow card and later Driscoll took a penalty from 30m for a Tottonians forward failing to retire at a ruck to make the final score.
Even then in injury time the home team were over the Wimbledon line only for Rees to make a heroic tackle to prevent the ball from being grounded, all credit to the referee for being right at the incident to make the decision.
All credit also to Tottonians who gained a losing bonus point and for Wimbledon the realisation that they cannot rely on the opposition’s missed kicks and the need themselves to avoid yellow cards, this week saw two Wimbledon players taking 10 minutes away from the match.
November 18, 2011
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