Mary's Finish Season with Head's Held High
written by Kayleigh Simmons
And its over, final whistle has gone, season has ended everyone is looking forward to Tour and drinking on Saturday nights but here's how it went to remind you:
The new captain, Sammy Knighton, has been a consistently amazing player all season filling in the number 10 spot for the latter part. Against London Welsh was no difference, she organised the backs, played some brilliant moves right up on the gain line and took some big knocks! The backs looked sharp once they got they ball and played it well, they also made more than there usual quota of tackles during the game suiting flanker Kayleigh Simmons playing out of position at 12. Lisa Yip was extremely well drilled and had an absolute steamer of a game at 13 putting her mark on that shirt for next season! The wingers Jen Cheshire and Laura Rugman made some superb tackles with Jen on her second game ever looking powerful with ball in hand! Lisa McCormick played out of position at 15 covering the space well! Was good to see Amy Yip come onto the wing in the second half for her first cap with Mary's!
The forwards had a tough game with London Welsh being strong in the set pieces. Layla Barron playing at hooker/prop/all over the field led the pack well, reading the game and changing the line out accordingly! The pack as a unit weight a lot less than London Welsh's but the props Helen Buckley (Homer), Layla Barron, Kerry Diedericks and Gemma King (Trump) held it together with the 2nd row of Abi Deas, Angie Francis and Bridget Sanger supporting them. The back row had a tough game with Trisa Mahoney's put up being spoilt every time and quick flankers to content with. Kirsty Fido, Lucy Bowering, Debbie Sharkey and Sophia Holbrook all supported every where on the pitch, rucked over and put the years work into the second half of the game especially! Jenny Rushworth at scrum half made a big impact, ordered the forwards around, read the ball and game well in a desperate attempt to get the backs across the try line!
London Welsh made breakaway tries where Mary's guard wasn't in or where the tackles did just not do the job - nothing that cannot be worked on!
Mary's have come out a fresh side this year with a new coach and committee. Neil Ward our head coach and his army of assistant coaches, Dean Jones, Steve Ridgway and Nathan Pratt have been coming up and donating their valuable time and experience to us which has been grately appreciated. I talk for the team in writing this - go blow some smoke up your arses and be proud of what you've done guys! We can't wait to see what your going to do to us next season (please no coathangers though!).
Nothing more can be asked of us girls - we played, we done well! We may not have a trophy but we have a strong unit to move forward with. It may not have been our finest game but it's been a steep learning curve and we have a few weeks to nurse ourselves back to health, get in some Saturday nights on the beach with the BBQ and get back out there - next season is MARYS!!!!! Hold our heads high and pat each other on the back!!!
On behalf of every girl that put there body on the pitch I also extend a big thank you and hug to the extended SMOBL family including the pregnant, the cripples, the wives, the fiances, the husbands, the girlfriends, the boyfriends, the too young, the retired (even though they all came back), the players that were away on Sunday for any reason and the men. In return for the generously sized thank you and hugs a bit of gentle nursing of the whole team back to full fitness by 12th July would be appreciated.
WHO ARE WE...................................
