High flying Hinckley brought down to earth with a spectacular South Bump!

Wow!
What a way to celebrate 90th years of rugby at South Leicester.
On the eve of the club’s anniversary celebrations South produced their most efficient display of the season after giving local rivals Hinckley a 15 point start.
South welcomed back Nick Griffin and Mark Bayley from long term injury and Max Castrogiovanni from his Tigers A team sojourn.

South started slowly as Hinckley exploited the talent of their young ”Swift” back division to race to a 20-5 half time lead with two converted tries and two penalties. South’s limited highlights were Nick Griffin and Nick Childs determined runs out of defence and a hard running unconverted try in the corner from Stu Bale after great combined work from both backs and forwards. Unfortunately, a high tackle and associated yellow card from Mike March meant playing with a man down from as early as the 13th minute. Bale did, however, score his try during that period of play.
Generally, in that period Hinckley were more organised and played with a level of confidence that reflected their league position.

Whatever was said at half time galvanised South into action as they, from the word go, upped the ante to take on the Hinckley forwards denying them any worthwhile possession. The South rolling maul made its force felt with Jones, Bayley, Antill and the Bale brothers to the fore enabling Kris McFedries to go over in the left hand corner for a fine score.
South repeated the dose this time on the right side that enabled Mark Lord to feed Rich Lang for a try under the posts after the forwards once again did the leg work with Max Castrogiovanni leading from the front. Lord converted to take South within 3 points and game on.
South had turned the tide and were in complete control as Hinckley’s heads went down as they couldn’t control the South onslaught. Gaz Jones motored over for South’s bonus point try after the rolling maul decimated the home defence. Lord converted for South to take the lead for the first time in the match.
Not content, South marched forward again with Stu Bale the scorer of the next try to extend the lead to 29-20 with 15 minutes left. Lord couldn’t convert.
South lost Griffin to injury and replaced Chris Bale and Gaz Jones with Wes Cartwright, Chris Mark and James Shepherd respectively.
Hinckley were now desperate to claw back some ground having been under the South cosh for most of the second half. Glover converted his third penalty to take them within seven points for a bonus addition. South lost Stu Bale to the bin as Hinckley mounted attack after attack as they became ever more desperate to take the game. Heroic South defence and pressurised mistakes from the home team thwarted Hinckley until the final whistle and the celebrations began.

Not a great start to the game from South, but what a second period of controlled forward play that blew Hinckley away. Confidence and uncompromising aggression was the order of the day as South ran out worthy winners of this pulsating local derby.

Team: Griffin (Cartwright), Devaney, Childs, Lang, Jordan, Lord, McFedries, C Bale (Mark), Castrogiovanni, March©, S Bale, Antill, Bayley, Green, Jones (Shepherd).

No man of the match this week as it was a whole team effort with perhaps the forwards shading the decision.