Taunton Warriors V Burnham on Sea

On a wet and windy night with greasy underfoot conditions it was a credit to both sides to try and play expansive rugby.  Whilst the Warriors had the ball a series of knock-ons gave the ball back to the opposition and it was Burnham who on 14 minutes opened the scoring with a try, which was not converted but gave them a five-point lead. This lasted for just 4 minutes before Marcus Heath storming into the line from fullback, went in for the Warriors opening try to level the scores, with the conversion being missed. Brother Ben Heath then showed some of his magic with several side steps and burst tackles to score the Warriors second try with the conversion again being missed.  Whilst there were opportunities for both sides the greasy ball led to several errors and the half finished with the Warriors having a slender lead ten-points to five.

The second half started with the Warriors having to defend some good attacks from Burnham but against the run of play Brodie Sheach won the ball from a Burnham lineout and burst through from the halfway line.  With one man to beat he drew that man and gave a well-timed pass for Ben Alvis to stroll in under the posts for the try which he converted. Just five-minutes later and the magic of Ben Heath came through again when he completely wrong footed the opposition to score the try and give the Warriors a try bonus point.  Burnham never stopped their policy of expansive rugby and showed a lot of talent to be rewarded with their second try on 62-minutes which they converted.  Meli Nevaka the third of the Warriors replacements was brought on in the backrow and with almost his first touch of the ball he broke from the back of a Warriors maul and ran almost half of the pitch to score an individual try under the posts of which the conversion was unbelievably missed.  With tired legs on both sides and the ground extremely slippery Burnham managed to break the Warriors defence for their third try which with the conversion gave them a ten-point deficit again.  The last play of the game was given to the two Ben’s with Ben Heath scoring the try and Ben Alvis converting to take the Warriors to 36-points.

Great credit must go to the ground staff who were able to create a ground playable for this match and credit will be given to them for getting it to recover ready for the next match.  Many good points came out of this game some of the drives by George Gosling on only his second game since last September showed he is getting back to real fitness.  It was sad to loose Alex Long with an injury but Nick Payne came on to work with Andy England in the second row and they were a formable pairing.  This put Ben Dodd back to number eight and his pick and drives always made headway.  Ever reliable Henry Webb makes the gaps and Ben is able to exploit them and on a dry day with a little more good ball Isaac Cambell Wu looks to be a good prospect on the wing.  Regardless of all of the mistakes in these difficult conditions the Warriors can be pleased with their performance.

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