Mayfield seconds v Cobras

After their unbeaten start to the campaign and Cobras failure so far to find their form some people in the crowd were predicting a rout for the home team at the Mayfield Sports Centre on Saturday (25 September 2010).

All good things must come to an end though and Mayfield’s poor performance gifted the Cobras the win they wanted.

Mayfield started brightly showing early glimpses of the fine rugby they have produced this season and only resolute defence from the Cobra’s kept the home side at bay.

With Snape and Howard making probing runs it was only a matter of time before Mayfield were on the score sheet, Simpson Ellis and White made big gains down the middle and Todd capitalised on this taking a pass off Lee to grab the first score Marsland converted.

The home side then seemed to lose the plot giving away possession and penalties to allow the visitors back in the game, the strong running Cigna made the most of this as he burst through some weak tackling to narrow the deficit. 6-4.

Both sides seemed to be affected by the local derby atmosphere and there were mistakes a plenty but when Marsland pounced on a loose ball to increase his sides lead it looked like Mayfield were going to resume control 10-4.

The cobra’s defence had other ideas though they regrouped at half time, whereas Mayfield appeared to lose their momentum, again more mistakes and penalties gifted their opponents field position and then to compound matters they twice gave away repeat sets in their ten metre zone the extra tackling took it’s toll on the Mayfield defenders and the Cobra’s made the most of it when Jo Qaniuci narrowed the lead to four points.

West’s conversion made the gap just two. There was no lack of effort from the Mayfield lads as they tried to re-impose themselves on their opponents but it wasn’t their day, Chrimes and Lane worked tirelessly to try to steady the ship with Snape and Biggins also in the thick of it.

The win was sealed for the Cobra’s when Simon Walmsley squeezed his way over in the corner, West converted from wide out 12- 16. This completed the scoring and the visitors stole the points and with them Mayfield’s unbeaten start to the season.

This was a scrappy game with too many unforced errors from both sides. Mayfield made more errors and gave away too many penalties thus gifting their opponents the points in a game they should have won.

Man of the match was Snape closely followed by Biggins and Ellis.

To make a bad day worse for Mayfield Paul Lane was sidelined with a broken wrist and will be out for several weeks - his power and pace will be sorely missed.