Firstly, as I usually moan about the weather I will big it up a bit as the lack of rain at this time of the year is a Brucie bonus for the “field of dreams” and all this means is …no sign of any cancelations. I walked across to the club first thing on Saturday and once again our chums the groundsmen had done a marvellous job of making everything look pukka and I might add, lots of people coming down to watch the game commented on how good it looked. Well done chaps.

So back to last weekend…. Well, t’was a busy one. The tidying/cleaning crews were out early, as was Justin our President, who had to step in to cook for our luncheon as Ann was away. There was also the small matter of two home games as well. That’s roughly 120 covers if you’re using pub terms. Big hand to him as it all went smoothly and he was also able to watch the game as well. Oh! must say thanks to Corrie and the gang who do the bar and serve the food, it was busy busy!
Our guests were the Beer boys and the Sponsor was Simon Bartlett who runs Beer self-drive motor boats. 23 of them turned up at 12.30 and they were the last to leave in the evening. During their visit they ate some of Justin lovely cooked pork, supped a beer or three, watched a good game of rugger and sung some songs as well and the club ended up with our biggest bar take of the season. Frankly a lovely bunch of chaps who all seem to enjoy a good day out. Somehow unfortunately, they also persuaded me to go to Paddyland with them to watch two games of rugby when Chiefs and Bath play their cup away games in January. Dooh!

Anyway, on to the game. Our visitors were Exeter Sarries who prior to the game were in third spot in the league which was one above us. After the game we swapped places as we moved past them with what can only be described as a comprehensive show of power and good running rugby. The final score was 60-12. We started very well up the hill but Sarries didn’t let us have it all our own way as they tried to counter our good start with a couple of tries and after 15 minutes it looked as if it would be a tight contest but as the game went on we increased the pressure and then put them to the sword and for the rugby purists, we absolutely mullered them in the scrums especially when we turned around and played down the hill. It’s also great to see that when we bring on our subs they also make a difference, dare I call them “finishers”? slightly disappointing for us after the game, was the fact not many of them stayed to eat the grub we’d put on. This is starting to get to be a worrying trend in rugby at the mo and it’s really not in the spirit of the game. Still… all said and done, it’s great to see our players and home supporters smiling and enjoying their rugby at the moment.
Oh… I mentioned the poor lad with caner last week and we did manage to raised £200 for his fund from the pitch side collection. Don’t forget his “just giving page” is still open if you want to donate.

On the top pitch our twos had a hard close game against Credition who are always a tough prospect when we play them and they are top of the league at the mo. We went down by 22-28. It was nip n’ tuck all the way through and they were 10-12 up at half time but they just about hung on to get the win. We’re now in need of a win or two keep us up with the league leaders in the division.

Sunday…It was the juniors turn to shine again perfect conditions for rugby and great to see both the Exeter Athletic boys and girls and ours respecting the 2 minutes silence and having read the match reports on the facebook pages it looks like we gave a good account of ourselves in all of the games. Loved the 11’s match report referring the performance to a crème Brulee which even included the actual dish for the finale…such a good read. Don’t forget everyone our managers put pictures and reports on the junior facebook page so you can see exactly what happened in way more detail than I can do in this nonsense.

So other things from the Ton… disappointingly we were not able to show the England game on Saturday because our satellite dish was broken. Actually given we lost, I wonder if that was a bad thing. Threw it away in the final minutes and as with the week before but at that level, games are won or lost by such fine margins. Things are not going our way at the mo. Anyway… we had an engineer out this week to fix our TV problems which he did but there’s a funny story on this… Gordon let him in and he said it was the dish, he looked at the roof saw a dish and proceed to get his ladders and fix it. Gordon did comment that the one up there didn’t look good and was very rusty. I arrived to relieve Gordon who was on watching duty and whilst the telly man got on with it I left him alone and pottered out the back. After about 45minutes the bloke came storming in and frankly wasn’t in a good mood. He’d made several trips to his van to get bits and bobs and had put a brand-new dish up, only to discover the wire running from the dish wasn’t actually attached to anything. Puzzled he then looked around only to find the proper dish which was actually at the other end of the club! It then took him 5 minutes to fix the problem but a further half an hour to dismantle his first installation! Heyho, he did eventually see the funny side of it after I made him a cuppa.

What else … we had a Committee meeting this week which was again, worryingly positive despite the usual problems of “money to tight to mention”. Must just say a big thanks to Chris Gould and Dave Vallender who between them are doing a lot of work on the grant bids and council wranglings etc. They are doing lots of unsung work for us all.

So on to this Saturday … we have a short visit to near neighbours Withycombe who are a mid table team at the mo. This is always a good fixture as we know lots of them. We’ve had the better of encounters with them in the last four games and we are a bit stronger than last season as well. So, I guess that means we are favourites but as I always say, you have to turn up so… let’s not count chickens . Love to see you there if you can make it but if you can’t, our Twos hold court at Tonsville when they take on Sarries Seconds and that should be a good close game. Both ko are at 2.30.

Then moving on to Sunday we have a packed itinerary for the junior section at home we have on the top Pitchall against Topsham the 10’s 12’s at 10am and then the 8’s at 11.30. On the bottom also against the Tops the 14’s who kick off at 10am then against Brixham our 15’s start at 1130am.On the away front we have the 7’s 9’s amd 11’s and their ko time is 10am followed by the 13’s who start at 11.45am. Must say a big thanks to James Vince who does a wonderful job organising all this week in week out.

That enough this week

#UTT

Jez