Mud, Grit and Glory

The all too familiar sight of heavy rain falling from the Devon sky again greeted the Royal Navy Senior Men’s team as they looked to take further strides forward in their second match of the season, this time against a Devon County XV at Brickfields in Plymouth

Nearly 500 hearty souls turned up to cheer on the teams on a night where distinguishing who was who in the mud became tricky after the first 5 mins. This was always going to be a test of who could keep the error count to a minimum and to keep the motivation high to win the big collisions in the toughest of conditions. A huge thank you to Plymouth Albion RFC for getting the pitch as match ready as it could be. It was probably just as well that they had an away league fixture just 3 days later as the RN and Devon tore up the pitch pretty good!

As was to be expected, there was a huge amount of endeavour and a willingness from both teams to keep the ball in hand, littered with the inevitable handling errors that were a consequence of the conditions. However, the RN were the first to somewhat master those conditions and scored the first points of the game after 15 minutes. A well taken line out catch and drive, followed by a number of forward ‘pick and go’ efforts saw a well-deserved try for the Navy pack, finished off by second row Will Scott and converted by fly half Jake Handley.

A second score quickly followed, more possession for the RN in Devon’s half and a very strong run from centre George Edson saw him break tackles and score next to the posts to allow his no 10 the chip shot conversion.

More possession and territory for the RN, who had the wind slightly at their backs in the first half, couldn’t be converted to more points and Devon began to make some rare incursions into the Navy half as the first period went on. A great bit of individual skill bought them back into the contest on the half hour mark when a deft chip and chase by the Devon fly half Mitch Pinkus from Brixham RFC saw him score but then sadly miss the conversion as it hit the post. This ended the scoring for the first half and the two mud covered sides went into the dressing rooms for a very well-deserved break!

HT Royal Navy 14 – 5 Devon XV

Devon returned to the field with a completely new starting XV for the second half looking resplendent in their clean shirts, but as in the first period, it took minutes few for them to be covered in the Plymouth mud. The half began with both teams again showing a huge willingness to try out their patterns and keep the ball in hand as much as practicable but that again resulted in knock-ons which led the game moving from scrum to scrum.

The crowd had to wait until 10 minutes from time until the first score of the second half, and it came from one of those many scrums mentioned earlier. A strong pick up and run from the Devon No 8, Robin Edbrooke from Topsham RFC followed by some close quarter work from the pack led to a try which was converted to bring Devon within two points of the RN.

The close quarter action continued, as did the big hits for the remainder of the half, although a slightly over enthusiastic late hit from a Devon player resulted in a yellow card with 5 minutes of the game remaining. From the resulting penalty an RN lineout was driven towards the Devon tryline, and the RN’s vice-captain Ben Mallett went over for the score.

That was the final score of the match and the players were no doubt looking forward to a hot shower after the obligatory mud-covered selfies with friends and family.

The RN now move onto Sixways Stadium in Worcester on 04 March to take on the British Police.

FT RN 19 – 10 Devon XV

Senior Men: K Allton, A O’Brien, D Cleverley: M Scott, W Scott; H Utton-Smith, B Mallett (VC), AJ Hussell; J Toogood, J Hanley, J Davis, G Edson, T Briggs, F Elliott, B Chambers (C).

Replacements: B Smith, H Wright, A Einchcomb, R Hawkshaw, T Ashton, D Rutter, J Bartlett, H Mayes, F Wood.

Words by Paul Clark

Images by Paul Clark