You’ll rarely see a better example of ‘a game of two halves’ than we witnessed between Stockport and Hoylake last Sunday. The previous game between the two sides had been a close run affair and Stockport coach Marc Smith had warned his troops to expect nothing less this time round.
As the game got under way it seemed that they had heeded his warning and although they were playing uphill and into a good breeze they quickly established themselves in an attacking position. They probed and pushed but faced determined defence. It looked that Stockport might be ignoring their best attacking options out wide. Then we got a break through in an unexpected way. With Hoylake pinned on their line they had a scrum and the ball went to their dependable No10 for him to clear his lines. Unfortunately he failed to get enough elevation on his kick and James Oakes charged the ball down and was first to the touch down. 5-0. Richard Morgan’s conversion attempt hit the left upright but everything seemed to be going smoothly.
I was then overtaken by a strong sense of déjà vu as immediately Hoylake came back down field and within minutes had equalled the scores with a score that seemed to suggest that the home side had left their usual defensive steel in the changing room. The remainder of the half didn’t seem to indicate that a try feast was in the offing and we even managed to concede another try and we went into the half time break trailing 5-10 and with a first defeat of the season very much in the offing. Marc got the guys together laid it on the line over what the 35 minutes meant.
The second half was a transformation. Tom Cruse lead the revival from the front and by example. The first of his tries came from another charge down. This time it was around the Hoylake 22 and the ball bounced up from the soft enough for Crusey to collect it and charge under the posts. He added the conversion 12-10.
I apologise in advance if I get any of the scores in the wrong order. Tom quickly bagged himself another when he popped up in the centre and hit the line at pace. He was in determined mood and was soon over the line. 19-10.
There were still four more tries. Dan Faram was inevitably in support when the Hoylake defence crumbled as Mike Pearson kicked ahead and he picked up close to the line. 26-10. The next two tries came from Ciaran Lofts and Richard Morgan and the points tally was rising fast 38-10.
The game did have it’s prickly moments. Hoylake already had one player in the bin when he was joined by a team mate and Louis Walker in a job lot. Then towards the end of the game one of Hoylake’s most talented had a testosterone over dose moment which culminated in him taking an early bath.
Our final try of the match was actually my try of the day and it came suitably from the man of the match Keeichi Isayama. He had come on in the second half and shown his pace and aggression all over the field. Anthony Coulson popped a well timed off load to him and Keeichi was storming through like a train. Good player Good try good to have him back playing for us…Final Score 43-10.
|