Bees travel sickness continues

The mazy journey to Copley and the train-spotters hike to the pitch set the tone for two tough games against Leeds Corinthians and Old Rishworthians.

George “Bite Yer Legs” Williams was Captain for the day and he led by example straight from the off in the first match v Leeds getting some early hard tackles in. Harry prevented a score in the early onslaught which Bees faced, as did George F with a try-saving tackle also. Bees went three tries down early on and Leeds displayed some tidy passing with organisation paying dividends. A cheeky rubber kick then caught Bees unaware which resulted in more doom at their expense. After a torrid first half, the Bees had a far better half starting with a tidy catch from the restart kick by Ismail. There was then a touch of flair from none other than the “Flying Beesman” namely Charlie, who managed to score another try to add to his season tally after a fine passage of play from a downfield kick and some heroic tackling from Thomas DB, and pressure play from Harry, Josh and Jacob. George Williams tackled like a demon to ensure Bees regained some respectability winning the second half 1-0 after the slow start.

The second game v Old Rish got off in a similar vein with an overlap leading to Bees going down 1-0. It was high time for drastic measures and to that end Curley was despatched on a few of his “Raging Bull” runs which brought the crowd to their tiptoes and had a number of Old Rish players getting a feeling of great impending doom as they went rapidly backwards! George F put in yet another try-saving tackle as did Nathan Hogg, who is notably always in the boiler room of muck and toil. Bees were unlucky not to reap greater rewards from their increased efforts in this game which was particularly frustrating.
In the second half, Bees were struggling to gain quality possession however there were a couple of hard tackles from Josh and DB. Ismail made a great drive forward and there was a quick probing run from Jake. Nathan put in a bone-shaking tackle late on which caused his opposite number to question which year he was in! Old Rish scored a late try after some creative play by their backs.

After a challenging morning, Man of the Match was awarded to George F for his exceptional work rate and tackles, and the Best Attitude Award went to Ismail for continually grafting away and showing great promise early in his career for the U12’s. Curley was awarded Old Rish’s opposition Best Player Award which was well deserved and a nice gesture by the opposition.

Next Sunday we welcome North Ribblesdale to the Hive as the curtain-raiser to the Christmas party.