Farewell to The Avenue
By Big-Al
April 7 2014
The final competitive match on the hallowed turf of the 1st team pitch at The Avenue turned out to be very competitive, but unfortunately, in typical London Irish style the Geese had to settle for the moral victory and 2 bonus points to help in their battle to remain in National League 2 South for another season.
The visitors – Hartpury College – are the league leaders and Saturday’s victory, combined with other results makes their promotion to National League 1 a near certainty.
Over the course of the 80 minutes, any neutrals in the crowd would have been hard pushed to say which team was nailed on for promotion and which was in a relegation battle. It was the Geese who dominated the early exchanges and opened the scoring after 11 minutes, Scott Tolmie forcing his way over the whitewash following a line-out. The conversion attempt was unsuccessful, so a 5-0 lead for the Geese.
Hartpury struck back 5 minutes later from the driving maul, the try was converted giving them a 7-5 lead. Hartpury were dominating proceedings at this time, and following a series of scrums Geese prop Eddie Fraher was sent to the sin-bin. While the Geese where a man down, Hartpury scored their second try, a promising break from the Wild Geese broke down and Hartpury ran clear to extend their lead, with the conversion, to 14-5. With half time approaching, Hartpury extended their lead further with a penalty to make it 17-5, but it would be The Wild Geese who would have the final say over the half – a good break by Tom Fowlie, who found winger Freddie Berridge, who ran in the Geese’s second try of the afternoon. Oscar Thomas converted, so at half time the Geese trailed by 12-17.
The Wild Geese started the second half strongly and took just 4 minutes to level the score with a try from Gerard Ellis, ignoring the attention of 2 or 3 Hartpury defenders, Gerard barged his way in from 15 meters out – the conversion attempt was unsuccessful.
The Geese where now enjoying a good amount of possession and territory, so it was against the run of play when Hartpury broke clear to regain the lead around 10 minutes into the half, the converted try giving them a 24-17 lead.
However the Wild Geese struck back within a couple of minutes – Tom Fowlie showed his pace and change of direction to find a gap in the Hartpury defence. Thomas converted and the score are level at 24-24.
An exchange of penalties, Hartpury first and then from Thomas for the Geese kept the scores level (27-27) well into the final quarter.
The Wild Geese took the lead through a penalty try, Scott Tolmie looked to be on for his second try of the match as he kicked through and led the chase for the line, but was taken down off the ball – this also resulted in a yellow card for Hartpury.
The conversion from Thomas gave the Geese a 34-27 lead with a little under 10 minutes + injury time to go.
Despite the Geese having a man advantage, Hartpury had the better of the final period of the match. A series of scrums deep in the Geese 22 first resulted in a yellow card for Charlie Connor and with all replacements used, an injury to Ed Hoadley reduced the Geese to 13 men.
There was a call from the Wild Geese coaches for uncontested scrums – but the referee must have been happy that the Geese had enough players still on the pitch with front row experience as the scrum remained contested – and when the next scrum went down, Hartpury were awarded a penalty try and with the conversion the scores were again level.
With the half about 50 minutes old, Hartpury won a penalty which was converted to give them a 37-34 victory. A disappointing way to finish what was a very enjoyable and entertaining match, with a great atmosphere which built as the game progressed. From the balance of play and the effort and passion shown for a full 80+ minutes, I feel that the Geese deserved more than the 2 bonus points they gained from this match, a draw would have probably been a fair result.
Following this and other results on Saturday, the Wild Geese have moved up one place to 10th in National League 2 South – but are just 4 points clear of the final relegation place. Their final 3 matches are all away from home – at Taunton Titans on (currently 7th) 12th April; Launceston (also in the battle to avoid relegation) on the 19th; and they finish at Ampthill (currently 2nd and in a battle with Canterbury for the promotion play off place) on the 26th.
One more win should be enough to keep the Geese in National League 2 South, and possibly a couple of bonus points will do.
Two Thirds of the Bible Code Sundays provided the post-match entertainment.
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