THE MIGHTY 29 - 26 Woodbridge 2s

With league toppers Woodbridge looking big and mean, warming up before half of our team had arrived, and having stormed some of our league table neighbours by up to 80 clear points, we were right to feel a little ominous.

With a solid start, Woodbridge secured two early tries, and more than one of the Mighty thought that this was going to be a bad day at HDL. Expecting the opponents to come back with some force, and continue their reign of power, we held tight and battled on. Playing harder than most of our boys would care to remember, we defended well.

The scrum was dominated, with a brutish front row, consisting of Scott Little, Jacobs and Gary Cawston, matching the size of their boys and giving us a presence up front. We easily won our own ball and contested well against the head. Line outs were of a similar ilk, as we pulled off a five man line out (something foreign to this league), to secure some great ball and give us some extra legs in the back line.

With some of the basics nailed, and the front game in hand, we had only to look to our back line for some reward, and some reward we got... taking us just shy of level for half time.

With a resurgence of players for this local derby, we had enough reserves to regenerate the squad and field a number of well placed interchanges for the second half outing.

With some fresh legs and some experience from yester-year, we held command over the second half. Woodbridge battled on and tries were scored at both ends. We nudged ahead by two tries. With 8 minutes to play, they scored again. With a few minutes remaining, we had only to keep them in their own half to retain the lead and take the victory. The final whistle; 29-26 WIN WIN WIN!

It was almost faultless... almost... Both Ipswich and Woodbridge full backs managed to knock on clean ball in their own 22. Travis, people told me you were good! A fumble from our centres to our wing, Blake Dean tried to clear the ball, but his boot met thin air and the ball was gobbled up by the opposition, again in our own 22.

But with the gaffs, came the gifts. Seb Kornjaca's size and speed was a notable addition to the game, and the ribs of the Woodbrigian who thought he was a shoe in for a score... it was not to be, as Seb cleared him out with a monster tackle, causing the ball to spill forwards and the player carried off.

John Lasbery controlled the game from 9, and made some lickety-split ground making skips up the park. John Searle, making the the grey hair look more like a fashion statement than an age thing, made some great decisions and booted us out of trouble more than once. Jeff Searle's 10 minute venture saw some sizable holes punched in the Woodbridge defense.

Our 'Man of the Match', Deano, with his second ever try, had a superb game all round, solid in defence and great support in attack. Close contenders were Fraser and Seb, who both had equally storming games.

Well done boys. Superb rugby!