South do the double over Luton

Luton RFC were the latest team to visit Welford Road for South’s last N3M home game of the season. Four successive away games will now need to be negotiated in order for South to further their ambitions in the race for promotion.
Dom Green came in at hooker, Gareth Clarke at full back, Dan Holmes at centre with Nick Griffin moving to the left wing. Adam Blayney, Andy Murdoch and Len Fincham made up the bench.

South were very tentative in the early exchanges as Luton dominated both possession and territory, creating a number of chances to score. However, good defence from both the back row of Mike March, Chris Bale and Josh McLaurin and the South backs kept the visitors in check.
Joe Murphy the Luton kicker squandered a straightforward penalty chance in the early minutes, while South’s Dan Holmes had to retire with a hamstring injury to be replaced by Andy Murdoch. Josh McLaurin was yellow carded after 20 minutes conversely jolting South into life!
With only 14 men on the field South put together a dynamic spell of attacking play yielding three tries in ten minutes. After a break out from defence, South were camped on the Luton line where the back-to-form Chris Bale was held up over the line by some desperate defence. From the resultant 5 metre scrum the South pack went into overdrive and pushed their opponents over their own line as Bale touched down. Mark Lord was narrowly wide with the conversion.
Another Bale incursion, after some good handling by Lord and Connor Smith, lead to South’s next try easily converted by Lord. Gareth Clarke added the next after further slick handling with a powerful run on a good attacking line. Lord again added the extras. Back to a full compliment of players South attacked continually although Mark Bayley had to leave the field after a head bang replaced by Len Fincham. Again, after quick handling by both forwards and backs alike, Nick Griffin scored the bonus point gaining unconverted try wide on the right.

The half time score of 24-0 more than reflected South’s superiority played before one of the largest crowds seen at Welford Road for some considerable time.

The second half initially was a replica of the first with Luton pressing to score. They were rewarded by a Murphy penalty to open their scoring for the day.
South then produced the try of the game as Chris Bale surged forward from a scrum, Kris Mcfedries drew the defence, slipped a wonderful inside pop pass to winger Phil Daffern who went over the Luton line for an unconverted try. Adam Blayney then replaced Stu Bale on the hour. The rest of the game is probably best forgotten as a lack of defenders resulted in Mark Kohler scoring an unconverted try for Luton while South were down to 13 men.
Yellow cards for Nick Griffin and James Stapleford - the latter resulting in uncontested scrums for the last ten minutes of the game – were awarded by an unconvincing referee probably intent on evening up the contest in its latter stages.
A strange game indeed where long passages of less than average play were only brightened by a twenty minute spell of brilliance that effectively won the game for South.

Team: Clarke, Daffern, Holmes (Murdoch), Smith, Griffin, Lord, McFedries, Bale C, March©, McLaurin, Badham S, Bale S (Blayney), Stapleford, Green, Bayley (Fincham)

Man of the Match: Chris Bale – back to form with some bullocking carries, sound defence and two tries.