Darlington 17 Ormskirk 7
On the way back from Darlington the bus driver put on a video. It was “Volcano !”, a disaster movie in every sense. In it Tommy Lee Jones attempts to stop a lava flow which wells up in the centre of Los Angeles and save the lives of his daughter and a cute kid while all around them minor characters die horribly. They throw buses in front of it, build concrete barriers in front of it, but the lava is unstoppable. So, just like the Darlington pack then.
Yup, the Darlington forwards might have only moved at 3mph but, like the lava, they were much too hot to handle. In past times young ladies in the North East of England devoted their spare time to dress making, crochet and embroidery. These days, up Darlington way, they devote their time to mauling. Defensive mauls, driving mauls, rolling mauls. Mauls from the line out, mauls off the back of the scrum. And bloody good they are at it, too.
The Ladies’ pack is a game bunch but hardly hard bitten warriors. They’re much more likely to present a short ballet before a match than perform a haka. And whereas the Darlington forwards seemed to have been hewn in standardised chunks from the same strata of rock the Ladies pack are a mixed bunch. They have every body shape imaginable from handy, pocket sized Kate “Triple L” Traynor at flanker through to gentle giant Jen Schofield at prop. And since they spend far too much time on their embroidery, they don’t have the cohesion and single minded vigour that the Darlington pack have.
Facing forwards as tight and together as Tetris blocks, the Ladies struggled in the scrums and line outs and, around the park, in the mauls. But, since the Ladies’ midfield defence was outstanding, a curiously unequal stalemate settled over the match. Yes, Darlington had the ball but they couldn’t do much with it from outside the Ormskirk 22. All the backs defended stoutly, none more so than Girl of the Game Louise “Mrs Robinson” Robinson. And the forwards themselves, outgunned in the tight, hurled themselves into many an open field tackle.
Of course, sooner or later the lava flow was bound to creep into the red zone and, without Tommy Lee Jones and a couple of buses to help, the Ladies went 7 – 0 behind. Penalised for delaying the put in at a scrum in their own 22, the Ladies delayed their reaction to the resulting free kick and dozed peacefully as Darlington scored.
Scrum half Anna “Rugby Nazi” O’Malley showed that Darlington were by no means invulnerable when she took a quick, tap penalty and outpaced a couple of front rows idling in the midfield before putting winger Clare “Shirley” Rylance in for a try. Fly Half Jenny Leitch converted.
No doubt the Ladies would have scored more tries if they’d won more ball. But once leggy lock Cath Nixon went off with a thigh problem … or was it a neck wound ? … possession by evil spirits was more likely than possession of the ball. There was a sigh of relief when another Darlington onslaught on the Ladies’ line ended in an Ormskirk scrum. The ball was duly hooked back, but it is hard to channel the ball with your head up your backside and the ball was coughed up for Darlington to make it 12 – 7 at half time.
In a second half littered with injuries the game descended into a muddy version of “Holby City” with the referee wondering whether he should have a white coat and a stethoscope rather than shorts and a whistle, and whether he should be timing the game with a calendar rather than a watch. It was more of the same. Darlington looked like they’d score every time they got into the Ladies’ 22 and the Ladies occasionally threatened to break away. Darlington did and the Ladies didn’t.
Darlington made it 17 – 7 with a Coach’s wet dream. Catching a ball cleanly at 2 they set up a driving maul and drove the Ladies back 10m for a textbook forward try. However, just to prove that they weren’t always that efficient, the Darlington forwards provided the game with its moment of mirth. The Darlington scrum half took a quick tap penalty 10m from the Ormskirk try line only to find that her forwards weren’t taking a blind bit of notice. By the time they’d turned round she’d been hammered into the turf by a gleeful Lou Prescott at No8. The Ladies might even have turned the ball over but, unfortunately, the hugely experienced Prescott was the only forward who knew the rules.
If everybody was as on the ball as Prescott the Ladies would have a lot more to laugh about.
