I'm on top of the WURL

WURL 24-16 Northampton

After a rocky start to the season, the chance for revenge came against a travelling Northampton side and WURL were poised to take it.

The rain was lashing the pitch. The wind raking across its surface. Yet as the sides came out, it was evident this was no problem for the mighty WURL who received the ball from kick-off. Within the first 20 minutes, WURL were 12 points up thanks to two sensational breaks from Matt Allen who scored one himself and supplied the ball to Ewan Mills for his first of the day. Both were converted by the veteran Brad Sheridan. As the game progressed the WURL line was broken by Northampton who crashed over from close range to score their first try of the game with a conversion. Soon after that was the half and WURL went in 12-6 up.

To get the Second half underway, WURL kicked-off and the sides were engaged in a tight arm wrestle until some smooth passing from the halves gave Azfar Zaki the chance to blow Northampton away with him crossing over to score WURL's third try of the day. However a tough conversion from out-wide was missed by Brad to make the scores 16-6. The game became an arm wrestle again with Brad managing to convert a penalty for WURL before Northampton struck back with a wide move from long range of their own to cross over in the corner to make the score 18-12. However, WURL replied with a wide move of our own with Ewan Mills crossing over for WURL's fourth of the afternoon with a hard conversion which Brad unfortunately missed. However a chance to redeem himself soon came about and he knocked over a penalty with ease. It was not until the dieing moments of the game that a deflated Northampton side found a response, crashing over when the WURL defence had switched off, making the final score 24-16.

Overall, it was clear that the lessons from the seasons earlier games have been learnt by WURL, with a much better defensive line shutting down Northampton's massive size advantage, and two man tackling aiding even further. Not only in defence were the lessons learnt, with much smoother wide moves making it easier for the pace of the WURL backs to be exploited.

A quote the WURL president, Ben, neatly sums it all up:

" A huge win for the lads. We knew the way we were playing we were improving week on week and so long as we played our game, we knew the win would come. Its an awesome feeling to take into the Christmas break. "

Warwick XVII:

1. Shahril Lufti

2. Billy Stanhope

3. Ewan Mills

4. Alex Harridine

5. Azfar Zaki

6. Matt Allen

7. Brad Sheridan

8. Ben McCormack

9. Ben Macintyre (c)

10. Aaron Powell

11. Danial Ariff

12. Tim Vos

13. Tom Dessington

14. James McHenry

15. Jamie Sly

16. James Hingston