Guess The Score ?!

All aboard the fun bus as Novos took two teams to Guisborough on the back of two home wins. However, as we have learnt this year nothing in this league comes easy. Early issues as we were one player short on departure however a travelling fan (Jake Pickering) had some gear thrown in his face and told he was our 18th man !

A decent warm up was no sign of what to come as Guisborough fielded the first kick and ran straight past some weak tackling, eventually leading to the first of several scores in the first half. Guisborough are good at what they are good at and simply found that running straight was enough at times as Novos tackled too high. We really struggled to get into the game and Guisborough were offloading at will. It was pretty much one was traffic as we limped to a 0-35 half time score line.

Time to gather our thoughts and decide what we wanted to do. With a potential cricket score on our hands I asked the players if they wanted to go to the bar and have a few beers or roll our sleeves up and put a bit of pride back in the shirt. Unanimously, the players agreed we could get back into the game if we raised the tempo and made our tackles. So with a target of winning the second half Novos started again.

We played the second half with real pace and used the ball well, having matched Guisborough's physicality upfront. First of all, Matthew Kilgore for the second week running cut a great line and sped in to beat the cover defence to the try line. Richard Dodd, just missed the conversion. Then Jonny Ward nabbed an intercept and ran 75 metres to score. Dodd this time missing by a little bit more. Our third try came as the backs shifted the ball to Lex Leonard who made it two tries in two games. This time Dodd must have hit the post as somehow the ball ended up behind him after the kick ?!

In the second half I am pretty sure Guisborough scored two tries themselves and were duly awarded 1.5 pts for each leaving the score a respectable 38-15 ?!

We have played two away games now and both games have been over by half time, this needs to be addressed next time we are on our travels. However, on both occasions we have one the second half in these matches. This confirms we have the ability and heart to match any team in our division.

Thanks to the ref, whilst I shared a few laughs with him he was in charge of a relatively entertaining game and no real injuries to worry about.

I must add that the hospitality from Guisborough was top class. There were a few games, a boat race and international drinking laws were applied at all times. We hope that we can return the favour when they visit Sutherland Park.

Next week, we have Hartlepool Rovers at home as we look to make it 3/3 at fortress Novos RFC.