U11's Run Nottingham Close

The short trip to local rival Nottingham Boots Corsairs is always a fixture that Ilkeston under 11's look forward to, historically a very tough event and an air expectation of a professional beating. However the only beating surrounded the Mothers beating the coaches who again were spending their day on the road!
Due to unavailability and injuries Ilkeston were required to completely change the personnel of the scrum. Making his debut was Jack Walker who had a crash course at hooking and quickly found his footing straight away aided by props Aidan Norris and Alfie Cox. The second row pairing of Felix Rasbusin and Cameron Greenfield provided the tightness required against a very strong Nottingham BC pack. Within the first five minutes the home side romped into a two try lead through quick ball to their wingers to score. The Elks slowed the ball down and with scrum half Liam Arnott-Clark using both Norris and Greenfield to impact holes in the Nottingham BC defence. These advances were finally met with success and Greenfield burst through to score through despairing tackles. Norris took a quick penalty from fly half Isaac Smith and launched an attack through the centre of the pitch. Tackles were aplenty but none could knock him down and he would immediately break off again, this time to score in the corner. Ilkeston were now level but with the euphoria came a awoken home side who finished the first half by running in two unanswered scores generally through missed tackles by the young Elks. Half time score Nottingham Boots Corsairs 20 Ilkeston 10.

The second half commenced with changes made by both teams, Introducing Luke Moore and Sam Rose for wingers Connor Corrigan and Zack Lebeter again Ilkeston were slow from the restart and immediately allowed the home side to score two further tries. Ilkeston were now looking down the barrel of a gun and unless they stepped up their game and reduced the amount of missed tackles we would see an injustice take place. The Elks woke up, the forwards competed in every ruck and turned over ball to provide ball to the backs. Smith constantly fed centres Tom Caines and Ben Middleton who endeavoured to make distance. Both players tackled like demons and provided robbed ball during this process for Norris and Greenfield to make valuable yardage. One of these plays involved Caines tackling is opposite centre collecting the ball and running through the field to score. Ilkeston's heads were now rising and a further advance into the Nottingham BC half allowed full back Joseph Doughty to cut back through the defence and slide past five players to score. With five minutes to go Caines again broke down the left wing to outrun the Nottingham winger and to score and setup a dramatic end to the match. This was not to be repeated however Ilkeston had in the last play an opportunity to distribute to Corrigan on the wing but the ball didn't quite reach his hands and the home side deservedly won the fixture. Final score Nottingham Boots Corsairs 30 Ilkeston 25.

A great performance by Ilkeston, improvement in tackling would have provided a platform to build on and without constant tackling by the centres the score would have been worse. Straight line out throwing for the first time this season provided by Walker was a highlight. Again the forwards contributed a fantastic performance and are developing into a very strong unit which bodes well for the future. Everybody contributed to a squad performance and with the return of the missing players will provide a dilemma to the coaches when picking the starting line-ups.

Team - Aidan Norris, Alfie Cox, Ben Middleton, Cameron Greenfield, Connor Corrigan, Felix Rasbusin, Isaac Smith, Jack Walker, Joseph Doughty, Liam Arnott-Clark, Luke Moore, Sam Rose, Tom Caines and Zack Lebeter.'

Man of the match : Forwards - Felix Rabusin, Backs - Joseph Doughty

Jon Doughty.