Ten Minutes of Madness Throw Away Victory

Ten Minutes of Madness Throw Away Victory

Indeed, all of their points came after replacement Bristol hooker Neil Clark had been harshly sin-binned after being on the pitch for mere seconds. Given that until then Northampton had scarcely had any attacks of note it is hard to see why the referee thought it necessary to immediately issue a yellow card. Perhaps it was an effort to even-up the numbers because it followed by a scant few minutes the carding of Harding (Sam) who had been a little to vigorous at a ruck. The refereeing throughout (although in no way responsible for the loss) was appallingly inconsistent and weak. Doubtless our Northampton comrades saw it differently, but to my eye the Bristol pack was clearly dominant, with the Northampton 3 failing to bind correctly or engage properly on several occasions, culminating by hurling himself into the ground and injuring his shoulder. There were numerous other infringements by both sides (whose hand was it that scooped the ball back for Bristol at a ruck in the second half – seen by all in the Centenary terrace - but not the officials?) which were missed or ignored. Even the sin-binning of Harding appeared to result from the protests of spectators on the Dark Side just as an early incident where the touch judge and referee felt a touch kick from Saints was made from inside the 22, but the Centenary Terrace crowd felt otherwise and the decision was changed. Weak and inconsistent, and not yet up to the job at this level.

Back to the game, however, and Clark ’s absence seemed to disrupt the pattern of Bristol ’s play and not just at the set-piece. The hitherto resolute Bristol defence became disorganised and nervous. As Bristol attempted to stem a Northampton attack Lee Robinson hoofed a kick downfield that drifted well infield to be taken by Bruce Reihana. This typified Bristol ’s defensive kicking during the course of the match which was frequently taken by Reihana who, although he was admittedly well-positioned, was aided by the knowledge that Bristol had no one who was able to reach touch consistently, particularly at longer range.

On this occasion Reihana was able to initiate an attack that ended with Saints’ replacement hooker Steve Thompson scoring in the corner. Just minutes later a Jason Strange kick down towards the Northampton 25 reared up nicely for Reihana who passed to John Rudd who lured Marko Stanojevic into the tackle, and then shipped the ball on to Sean Lamont for a virtually unopposed run to the line. This made it 16 – 12 to Bristol with about eight minutes on the countdown. Now the flurry of replacements by the Bristol coaching team had its real impact with too few old-hands on the pitch with the experience to slow down the play and hold on for a win. This was compounded by the continued absence of Clark .

Bristol proceeded to make a mess of a scrum in the Northampton half and conceded a penalty; the Saints counter-attacked with some energy, sensing that an unlikely victory was now possible. They forced a scrum five metres out and as the ball ball was inched towards the try line Ben Cohen burrowed over. In fact he appeared to knock-on as he went over the line, but inevitably it was missed by the officials. The conversion made it 16 -19. A few minutes remained but Bristol were unable to work their way into a scoring position to rescue the situation.

Before this final 10 minutes, Bristol had been in charge right from the opening minutes when Strange kicked the first of his three long-range penalties. Stanojevic's try gave a 13-0 half-time lead and came after a sustained period of Bristol pressure where a combination of a lack of penetration by the Bristol attack and the inability of officials to judge whether a pass is forward (it wasn’t and Bernardo Stortoni should have had his ‘try’ allowed) permitted Northampton to hold their line intact Bristol had plenty of opportunities to seal victory in the second period after twice scorning the chance to kick penalties, and spending at least 10 minutes camped in the Northampton 22, without being able to fashion a score.

So defeat snatched from the jaws of victory by Bristol, but there are positives to take from the game. Until the last, momentous, phase the Bristol defence was generally good with Bristol tuning over Northampton several times. The threat of Carlos Spencer was largely nullified by the back-row and half-backs. Our defensive kicking, however, remains suspect and a better side than Northampton might have been able to make more of our failed touch finders much earlier in the game. Individuals performed well, with Mariano Sumbucetti and Roy Winters effective in the second row and Geraint Lewis continuing to demonstrate that he is one of our most skilled players. The appearance of Danny Gray as scrum-half (and Shaun Perry had clearly been carrying an injury for much of the match) was an interesting move and his distribution was very good despite the chaotic scene around him. Perhaps this is his future position? A disappointing end to our home campaign, but Bristol have done more than scraped survival in the Premiership and it is a measure of how expectations have been transformed that that just a losing bonus point against Northampton (which takes us above B**h, by the way!) had no impact on our league status. We’ve one more league game and then comes the silly off-season with every club linked with every and any player and the chance for Bristol to lay the foundations for increased success in the season to come.

And as for the Moz Memorial Match II...