U15s bounce back with win against Old Rutlishians

The U15 squad started the match looking to prove to themselves that last week’s defeat against Reeds Weybridge was an aberration.
And prove it they did against Old Ruts on a wonderful autumns’ morning in near perfect playing conditions. After withstanding the pressure for 9 mins, Old Ruts finally succumbed to a well worked try finished off by Micah Goldson but involving every member of the back line. Diran Oresanya converted the first of his four kicks.
For the next ten minutes both teams cancelled each other out in the forwards. On 19 minutes, Sam Kabia playing in his favoured open flanker position ran through Old Ruts’ defensive line to score the first of his four tries. Not wishing to be out done, Harvey Akeme picked up a loose ball on Old Ruts 5-yard line to score his try.
Old Ruts tried to get back into the game but the boys tackling and defending prevented them from getting any go forward ball. Abhinav Menon, Jayden Whyte and Samad Tahir coming off the bench as rolling subs gave the team energy.
Jude McDonnell as hooker threw the ball in straight and won every hook on our put in. Even when they did break through the defensive back line, Aldo Bagatti at full back was there to clear up any threat. Sterling defensive work from Samad Tahir, Julian Briamah and Cillian Lawlor snaffled Old Ruts’ attack before it ever got going.
Just before half time, Sam scored again.
The improvement in the ball carrying efforts by Rene Boadi and Sebastian Douglas was acknowledged. The half back pairing of Tom McKeone and Diran Oresanya controlled the game intelligently and the centre pairing of James Ward and Jaden Wallace-Anderson is the start of something good. A combination of soft hands from James and running straight hard lines from Jaden, gave the team a good platform to build on.
Shortly after the beginning of the second half, good work by the pack released Sam to score his hat-trick. The confidence of the players was running high and when Diran showed off his footballing skills by finishing off his own hack from inside his own half, the game was one score away from being stopped (the 40-point rule). However, the boys switched off and Old Ruts scored their first try. Sam got one try back but Old Ruts grabbed another. With two minutes left on the clock, William Robinson ran 80m to score a superb solo try.
With seconds left on the clock, Man of the Match Jaden capped off a fine win with a well taken try.

We look forward to playing Battersea Ironside on 15th December.