South v Forest

Match report - Leicester Forest v South 27/11/16

The eagerly awaited return fixture with local rivals Leicester Forest was always going to be tough battle and it didn't disappoint. On the back of an excellent win against Oadby, the South lads were on a high and keen to continue the brilliant form they showed last week.

From the kick off there was some messy play in the middle of the park, with centre Spencer putting early pressure on the forest midfield. The South pack started to ruck really strongly and were clearly getting the better of the large forest pack. The pack won the ball and fed out to Sam, who made a scorching mazy run and outpaced the Forest tacklers to score our first try.

0-5 to South (Con missed)

From the restart the South pack were proving formidable and won more ball and some excellent passing between Reece and Joe, set Joe steaming down the left wing, excellent support play recycled the ball several times, until the ball went out to the centre where Luke came crashing onto the pass and was unstoppable from ten yards out to score our second try !

Jude popped over the kick,

0-12 to South

The forwards were really putting a good shift and were winning ball after ball in the loose and winning lovely clean line out ball. This allowed the backs to start running a the Forest three quarters. Callum made a darting run and the back went wide to Ronnie who made some good ground and presented beautifully for the marauding South pack.

Forest though rallied and unleashed their big dangerous runners at us. Man of the match Alex toon made some stunningly brave tackles on the forest mountain of a centre, not once but several times, stopping some very dangerous attacks.

Play reached our 22" where we forced the forest attack out into touch, we threw in, Mitch soared up into the air, off the top to Reece, some sniping play and then onto Jack who stormed through the defence to hammer into the forest 22" a desperate tackle from their giant centre bought him down but Callum was screaming up in support and nearly managed to take the pass, beautiful play.

Forest were still battering away at us and managed to steal a score back and popped over the conversion

7-12 to South.

The play restarted and the South pack again started to turn the screw on Forest. Jude brilliantly charging down a clearance kick. The ball was won and Cam went charging at the Forest pack, taking three tacklers to bring him down. It was becoming end to end stuff though and Forest went firing off down the right wing and Sam made a lovely tackle to stem the attack.

Half time 7-12 to South

Forest started the second half brightly and mad repeated attacks, forcing some desperate tackles, with Jack scything their half backs downs around the scrum and George driving strongly with ball in hand. Despite this play forest won the ball managed to drive over for an equalising score. Conversion missed

12-12 !

Jono was on at hooker and fearlessly took the ball forward smashing into the Forest forwards. South built on this and then came the South try of the season so far (in my opinion!)
The pack recycled from a ruck, the ball was fed out to Jack on the crash, he stormed through several tackles, to then pass to the ever busy No8 George who took a lovely off load, then made some hard earned yards himself crashing through tackles to then off load to Callum who still had to work hard to scream down the right wing to score a truly stunning a well worked try ! Conversion missed.

12-17 to South

Forest responded well though and through a lack of concentration from South scored another equaliser ! They netted the extra two points from the kick

19-17 to Forest.

South showed some real character, winning the ball and passing through the hands to Sam, who showed some electric pace to score a beautiful try under the posts ! We missed the chance for the extra two points,

19-22 to South

South powered back at Forest again from the kick off and worked our way towards the line and managed to feed Luke who had a big game in the centre to score his second by crashing through near the posts. Callum scored the conversion

19-29 to South.

We should've have sealed the match there and then, but to their credit Forest found another gear and launched a series of attacks at us which despite some phenomenal tackling, with Jack and George hammering people, mitch, joe and cam smashing into their pack we couldn't stem the tide and conceded eleven points in the final minutes of the match !

The forest fly half kept his cool under the pressure and kicked the winning conversion in the last play of the match.

31-29 to Forest.

Well lads this game had it all, it was real end to end stuff. Some of our play was magnificent and you can feel proud of the tackling, passing and running today. If we can remain focussed and disciplined for the full hour we will win many matches. Some of the tries and running was fantastic to see and in the first half we were demolishing their bigger pack.

Let's pick ourselves up, training hard this week and go to Barker Butts on Sunday with a point to prove, we will have another chance against Forest on the 18th Dec, where we can turn the tables again !

Well done everyone and well done to John Gibbins who made his debut on the wing and secured some game time, I'm sure we will see a lot more from John in the forthcoming weeks !

Man of the match was Alex Toon, who was outstanding ! His tackling was brave and fierce and stopped a big powerful lad many times ! Well done mate, keep it going !

Huge thanks to our man with the camera - Gary Jackson, who generously sponsored this weeks match, much appreciated Gary ! Top bloke !!