Aldridge power to victory over Claverdon

An impressive effort from the forwards on saturday resulted in a great victory over Claverdon from Mids 4 West South. The 'best laid plan' lasted approximately 2 minutes on saturday after number 8 Ben Pittam, in his first performance of the season, went down with a serious knee injury. The omens didn't look goos as following a shuffle around, with Chris Balmforth moving to 8 and Joe Cowdell-Jones making his first team debut on the wing, Aldridge conceded two early unconverted tries within the first 10 minutes. What this squad has this season is massive belief in themselves and each other and as the half progressed we slowly grew into the game.

We saw a welcome return to Adam Morris at full back who shone in defence and threatened every time in attack. Debutant Fly Half and Rugby League convert Drew Adams started to orchestrate the play in his first game of Rugby Union since he was 15, and with the centre partnership of Ryan Bowen and Brad Russell starting to find holes, we were soon on the scoresheet with winger Ben Eden touchdown in the corner for a converted try.

The Aldridge set piece was impressive throughout, with Jim Arnold, Liam Burlace and Alex Reed at the forefront. Tight head prop Ellis Garratt was everywhere in the loose, and following a lot of hard work this week, the lineout delivered clean ball throughout for scrum half Lea Ross.

Despite conceding a try late on in the first half, mainly because of a series of missed tackles Aldridge were very much in the game at 15-7 down at half time.

The second half was where the pack took control, firstly Chris "Barnie" Balmforth powered over following strong work from hooker Mark Smith and Adam Butler (Unconverted). Then soon after Lee Stokes sniped over following a catch and drive from a line out with the back becoming involved.

Barnie soon added a second again following great work from the forwards, and then sealed his hat-trick with a quick tap and go penalty to secure a 27 - 15 victory over the side who finished just outside the promotion places last season.

Head Coach Jon Arch:
"We are obviously gutted about Old Man Ben, he had started strongly and had carried the ball 3 or 4 times in the first couple of minutes; he has promised me 20 games this season, so hopefully he will recover quickly."

"The lineout and scrum were superb all day, and it was this platform which secured the victory, when you give good clean ball to our backline they will find holes; Drew did great on his first game for the club, especially when you think we had a very inexperienced back line to support him."

"And Barnie was simply immense! When you consider we were missing most of our normal strike runners in Josh, Forest, Danny Mac, Jordan Russell, Ed Tonks and Nick Yates, plus new signings Harry Baldock,Ben Giles and Dan Beggan, and also still have Luke Russell, Adam Reed, Alex Yates, Lewis Underwood, Sean Howard, Ed O'Neil (who scored again in the 2's) and Josh Hetherington still to come back into the mix for selection - it really shows how far the club has come in the last 12 months."

"We have gone through Pre-season unbeaten which really gives the guys confidence going into next weeks first league game at home against Yardley & District RFC."