Manor 3s produce a terrific comeback

In the week running up to this game Manor 3s found themselves without the services of about 20 players due to work, injury, hangovers and holidays. However Manor pulled together and promoted some players from the 4s and colts to build a team. Old boys like Steve Coggins (did you hear about the try at canvey he scored) and John Phillipson came out to play and boost numbers.

As always Werner led the warm up and went through his moves. At this point I looked around to note whether Pete Thomas was standing eating his banana and was shocked to find he was joining in the warm up. After that I went round making sure everyone knew who was who and introducing our two new recruits Giovanni and David Gibson.

Manor started off the game with an old school pack and a pair of crash centres with the ageless Ralph Nocaro and rugby league convert Dave Gibson. Manor played the phases with crash balls however the canny Southend team read our game well and neutralised us well. Manor then found ourselves guilty of several penalty offences and Southend crashed over to score a try. Southend then found good field position and after a couple of phases Adam Reay intercepted on our try line and raced 80m to score a break away try. However Southend kept their heads on and continued to build a lead, scoring 3 good tries despite some excellent Manor defence. Towards the end of the half Mad Sean got a yellow for a tip tackle. However the Mad south African could be forgiven as he had already managed to single handily stop 3 Southend phases by himself. Manor went in to the halftime knowing work was to be done.

By this point our Colts had got out of bed or finished visiting their uni and were ready to come on and replaced some old and tired legs. Straight form the kick off Manor spun the ball out to Damore who stepped his man and passed to Tom Howell who scored from his 22 and left the Southend full back for dead. Manor then got the ball outside to Billy who stepped his man to score another try. With all these tries converted manor found themselves leading 21-20 despite being a man down! The game then found its pattern of Southend playing some good phases before manor grabbed the ball and run Southend out of the game. Manor’s other tries came from; Adam reay scoring his second after sprinting clear down the left wing, Ralph showing his agile side sidestepping the drifting Southend defence to score, Edward winning the footrace to score after a kick through by Tom Howell and yours truly managed to find a gap in the Southend defence. However the try of the day was made by Giovanni after he charged through the defence before offloading to Mad Sean to score. Southend managed to grab a good score despite losing their winger to injury.

Final score Manor 3s 53- 25 Southend 4s.

A fantastic result for Manor. Every player who played had an excellent game. Credit goes to Southend who played hard and never gave up. Manor however played the right tactics with the old boys in the first half keeping it tight before the youngsters in the second half running wide.
Humorous incidents in the game included Ralph not getting the message about Giovanni’s name and calling him Bruno. Needless to say Giovanni is now called Bruno by everyone. Mad Sean showing leadership by being vice captain (who ever thought that day would happen!). Giovanni and his porn star shorts and finally my dropouts which Steve Coggins complained about all day long and didn’t understand when I said “I don’t know where they are going!”

Manor once again had a perfect mix of youth and experience with older players like Mad Sean and Ralph being great leaders. Despite having 8 changes this week from the starting team there is a core to the side with Ant and Anthony up front, Mad Sean and myself in the back row (usually) and Keeny, Tom Howell and Ginger Billy in the backs. Once again the Braai master Werner organised things well from the side showing excellent nous with his substitutions!

Man of the match had included some votes for Anthony, Ant, Edward, Ralph, Giovanni and weirdly John Makowski but the winner by a vote was Adam Reay who scored 2 good tries and defended well. I would also ike to give special mention to Aiden who raced back at great cost from a uni open day to have another cracker of a performance in the pack.

Makowski moment included votes for; Anthony Jordan-Cant remember why, Adam Reay-for not passing, ralph for being 50 years old, Ginger Billy for running into contact, Joel for nominating himself to do a touch finder (pete found this very disturbing!) but the winner was John Makowski however he had gone home so Mad Sean and his yellow card had the honours!

Next week Manor 3s have a rest before taking on local rivals Ilford Wanderers on the 9th November.