Moles 10 HMYOI Cookham Wood 10

On a glorious mild winters day made for rugby, the Moles welcomed GRFC IV team stalwart Richie Mayhew's team of screws from Her Majesty's Young Offenders Institute at Cookham Wood, Rochester.

The Moles' festive fixture usually attracts a squad of thousands looking to dust off their kit to show the younger Moles and wannabes how it's done but this season saw a relatively small turnout of 23. However, with the Screws down to 14 despite 'ringing' up some new familiar faces in Abbott, Baker and Grant to add to their regular familiar faces from GRFC in Woodbine, Drobka, Mitch, Jetski and of course Mayhem, Sam 'Turncoat' Holden seized the opportunity to cross the corridor and join his 'real mates' in the opposite changing room. This turned the fixture into a Moles versus quasi-Gannets match!

The Moles enjoyed most of the possession in the first half competing well in the rucks, mauls and line outs and making the most of the Screws' handling errors and lapses of discipline. Some strong ball carrying from the likes of a returning Oaf and Big Bri and good tidying up around the edges from Posty, Ork, Elvis and El Tel saw the Moles camped in the opposition half; but as is so so often the case in Moles rugby, not turning possession into points. Perhaps wary of this, a surprising decision to kick for goal from a penalty awarded just outside the 22 and in front of the posts was taken. Uncharacteristically, Brian Rayner's kick failed to slot between the posts; starting a rare pointless day for him with the boot.

The scrum however was different story with the heavier Screws' pack and particularly a wily front row dominating proceedings up front throughout the game. Nonetheless with typical Moley grit and determination, accepting that they were likely to go backwards, the Moles pack worked hard to get the ball out of the back of the scrum as quickly as possible for Will McKee to pick and go with at 8. The loss of tight head prop Brucey with a dislocated finger after 20 minutes didn't help proceedings either.

Once known in Moles circles as 'The Mighty Atom', Jeff 'Nod' Saward was yet again the epitome of the Moles rugby with yet another 'Mole-of-the-Match' performance in the first half. His 'heart of lion' beating strongly as he organised the team from scrum half and led by example making fierce tackles. It was perhaps fitting that Nod should be the player to break the deadlock with a determined drive for the line on 25 minutes.

The scrum situation aside, the Moles team that retreated to receive the ball at the restart was feeling confident that it could 'kick on' and win the game. However, on a day where relatively few serious errors where being made in defence, a sequence of three consecutively missed tackles let the Screws' pacy left wing through to cancel out the Moles' lead after only five minutes.

Fly half Darren 'Rugby League Mole' Oram rallied the Moles behind the posts as the Screws' kicker also began a pointless afternoon with the boot; "...what we need is to get back down the other end score again from the restart" and give or take a few phases and maybe a set piece or two, that's pretty much what happened with that man Oram sidestepping his way through the Wood defense from 10 metres out to restore the Moles 5 point lead.

Half-Time 10-5

As is always the case in Moles rugby, a number of half time changes upset the balance of the team in the early exchanges of the second half and Cookham Wood began to assert themselves more on the game in terms of both possession and gaining territory deep in the Moles half.

However once settled, the Moles continued to defend valiantly denying the heavier Screws' forwards from driving over at close range on a number of occasions. Alas though, the Cookham Wood dominance in the scrum was always going to pay dividends at some point. A Moles scrum 15 metres or so from their try line was pushed up the smaller hill on 'Banana 2' leading to a ruck being formed on the five metre line. Although the ball came out on the Mole side, a stray Mole in the channel between replacement 9, Merv and replacement full back Jamie Rayner arguably created enough of a delay for Sam 'Turncoat' Holden to anticipate even better what was coming next before then successfully charging down Jamie's kick, gathering the ball and driving over to score the equalising try . To be fair, it was a great try that capped an outstanding performance from Sam in the opposition back row. He was an absolute nuisance all over the pitch, (as was fellow IV team flanker Matt Abbott) particularly at the ruck and in the line out.

Skipper Mick Terry must have thought why did I give them Sam and not Velcro? Joking aside though, this fixture saw Velcro's best ever performance in a Moles shirt: reliable as always when lifted at the line out, some good carries and of particular note some impressive tackling not least when the Screws' aforementioned pacy winger threatened to break away only for Velcro to bundle him very convincingly into touch.

With the momentum, the visiting team was most likely to win during the remainder of the second half. But the Moles simply were not going to allow that to happen and continued to defend resolutely for the remainder of the match. Adding to the on pitch cheer leading was the Moles only currently playing 'Sweatie' and sexogenarian Q with his familiar cries of "Readae readae op!" and "Gie efter heem laddie" and a few impressive "They main tak' uir li'es but they'll ne'er tak' ma baa" charges up the wing.

Jamie Rayner picked up his usual injury playing for the Moles and that was that. Final score 10-10. Most agreed that it was a fair result.

A final mention has to go out to Neil Martin for managing to play all of the second half without tackling one of his own players despite both teams wearing predominantly black shirts! Certainly an improvement from the tour fixture against Torquay earlier this season when he took out no less than current 1st XV Fly Half Gary Gray because, "Well, they were wearing black and white hooped socks as well!"

As mentioned earlier Mole-of-the-Match was awarded to Nod for the second successive game and he enjoyed a home brewed cider alongside the Screws' skipper Mayhem and Will McKee who as the only third team player to get game time today due to Maidstone blowing them out, was voted Man-of-the-Match and Dick-of-the-Day by IIIs skipper Drunken Stu.

After another good result, the beer tasted good and one or two more extrovert Moles later indulged in some topless drinking in the lounge bar at the ridiculous time of 7pm; proving yet again that the Moles is something much much more than a rugby team!

Line up: Elvis, El Tel, Neil Martin, Brucey, Hair Bear, Big Bri, Posty, Oily, Ork, Nod, Darren Oram, Merv,, Shotgun, Lloydy, Brian Rayner, Jamie Rayner, Adam Jenken,Velcro, Will McKee, Paddy, Mick Terry, Q, Sam 'Turncoat' Holden, Russ Turley

Referee: Dave Norman