BARNSLEY RUFC U16 MATCH REPORT

SELBY, SUNDAY 16th MARCH 2008, 12 NOON KICK OFF.
OPPONENTS – SELBY
REFEREE – SUPPLIED BY THE HOME TEAM
SCORE –BARNSLEY U 16’S – 34 SELBY – 8

SCRUM SHUNNED AT SELBY

Our return to Selby, over a year after the “George Foreman” incident, was greeted by packed, muddy fields, and the news that the home ref. insisted that the game had to be played with uncontested scrums, or not take place at all. Therefore there was no choice at all.

How you can field a team of U16’s with no front row, is almost beyond belief.

The game unfolded as frustratingly as the Barnsley support had feared, you only realise what scrums bring to the game when you are denied them. Even with our big guns Powell and Lister absent from the team, there was more than enough out there.

11.55am Marlon Wragg try , con missed by Jack Churchill. 0 – 5

12.07pm Churchill try, con missed. 0 – 10

The field was uneven , and there was a strong biting cross-wind, which obviously affected both teams, but over anxiousness, and a truly poor referee adversely affected Barnsley’s efforts. Many chances went begging.

To cap it all Rob Mynett was sufficiently seriously injured in a pile up to ensure he took no further part in the game.
The ref. ignored blatant infringements, and seemingly invented new rules of his own.

I am normally very supportive of anyone brave enough to go out in the middle, but as Inspector Harry Callaghan once said, “A man’s got to know his limitations.”

After Sandra and I were treating junior, and placing him in the car to take him to A& E ,half time came and went, Selby scoring an unlikely try to make it 5 – 10.

That’s the last I saw of the game, I left reporting in the hands of a prospective successor.

I’m told that both Churchill and Brad Wood scored further tries, one converted. 5 – 22

Somewhere along the line Selby slotted a penalty kick. 8 – 22

The game finished with a welcome try for Captain, “Diamond” Jim Haigh, and Jordan Hulme, the latter being converted.
Final score 34 – 8. Fair play to the Selby lads, who from what I witnessed, and from what I have been told, got stuck in and made something of a game of it.

BARNSLEY MOTM - BRAD WOOD? – If not, it’s not a bad guess.