Champagne finish for champion 2nds

At the end of a great championship winning season Novos headed up to Ashington in the hope they could continue finish a truly epic season on a well deserved high.

The day did not start positively with several no shows and and some miscommunication with people meeting us at Ashington, we finally left the club an hour later than we should have and with only 14 players. On the way out the club Sam Sharp was kidnapped from the Centurians and taken with us to ensure we had a starting 15.

We arrived at Ashington and had to get changed quickly, A welcome change of note was that the skipper remembered shirts, balls and water bottles, so we were somewhere near being organised! Everyone headed out, performed a lightning quick warm up and a couple of hasty run throughs and it was time for Kick Off.

Novos elected to kick and immediately showed their intentions with a strong chase. After several strong attacks from both sides Novos broke the deadlock when a bullocking run from Alex Hind saw they young back rower smash his way over the line to score Novos first.

Ashington kicked off and with a good kick put Andy ‘Trigga’ Barnes under pressure to catch, it was to no avail as he caught the ball well and returned back at them with a solid driving run. After some good phase play Novos were. back in Ashington’s 22. Quick ball from the back of a ruck gave Trigga space and he was able to pinch a try and 'belly flopped' a slam dunk try under the posts (must be a rugby league thing!).

Trigga repeated the trick moments later with almost a carbon copy try of his first and was able to receive a nice pass from Jason Mcdermott to score second try of the game, which was slightly more graceful…… But only just.

At this point Novos received some reinforcements after some last minute desperate phone calls from a pleading skipper to players who were unavailable but managed to get themselves up to Ashington. Substitutions were made and the rolling subs rule was utilized to keep everyone fresh. Rory Diggle took to the pitch to replace Jack Watkins after a teeth rattling head collision left Jack bleeding from the mouth, (thankfully not the same as the teeth rattling collisions that Jack is used to from his Saturday night Job).

Some strong play from Ashington allowed them to work into Novos half. With an Ashington scrum deep in Novos territory Novos prepared to defend, with a quick pickup from their strong No8 Ashington went blind and created an overlap for their first try which was well converted.

The game resumed with more strong rugby from both sides. Rory Diggle was moved to his preferred position of wing and Jack reinstated at centre.

Trigga then injured his shoulder and with no forward replacements reorganization of the backs got his position covered. Ashington attacked strongly with new vigor after getting points on the board. But with stoic defense and some selfless tackling by Sam Sharp who put his body on the line to stop the big Ashington winger no more points were conceded.

Unfortunately during the defensive efforts Rory re-injured his knee and was unable to continue. With some ‘encouragement’ (Cries of MAN UP) Trigga rejoined the action and replacement winger Smithy came on.

Novos benefitted from the half-time talk and received some clear instructions from Clive Carlin as to how we should go into the rest of the game. Novos forwards needed to work even harder and as a result this would unleash the backs more effectively. The forwards stepped up and with quicker ball from Shallcross and good distribution from Jason the pace and strength of Novos back line could not be handled by Ashington, and with some great passing and support Jack Watkins scored his first of the game.

The game continued in this vein, Novos forwards dominating all aspects of their game providing an excellent foundation for the backs to exploit space and core. It wasn't long before the ball came out again with Jack drawing his man and popping a great pass to Jamie Diggle to score and continue his incredible scoring form for the 2nd XV.

Ashington began trying to keep Novos pegged back in their own half with some good kicking play but with Novos forwards being so strong the ball was ran back and recycled quickly to return them back into the Ashington half.

in one such foray James Shallcross let a quick pass away to Jason, who with a quick change of pace and direction was able to dance through the Ashington defence and increase his personal points tally with a good try.

Ashington continued to employ same deep kicking tactic but were undone with a long cross field pass from Jamie Diggle to Jack Watkins who stepped the oncoming Ashington backs and with an audacious dummy that even had himself fooled for a moment and a strong hand off saw him barge over the line for his second.

After the kick off, Novos formed a ruck near the half way line. A James Shallcross did a pick and go and sniped his way through the defence and bore down on the incoming fullback. As the Ashington 15 closed in for a tackle James opted for a neat chip over the top but was tapped in the face by the Ashington 15 as he ran past. To Novos dismay James dived to the floor like a ballerina with a scream none to far from that of a baby girl. The chip meanwhile hit the post and waited like a lonely beautiful lady at the bar waiting to be scooped into the arms of a musclebound Novo and taken gently over the line for a definite try, the resulting penalty was akin to pulling her fat mate and earned much scolding for Shallcross.

The game kicked off for the final time with Sam Dixon again catching the ball but choosing to offload to Jason McDermott who put a great kick chase and resulted in a Novos line out. A 5 man line out was opted for with Jonathon Smith and Alex Hind dropping out. The ball came off the top to Shallcross who whipped it out to Jason who then drew the defense out but gave an inside pop to Alex who blasted up the field to become one on one with the fullback, the ever diminutive Chris Donabie was in full support screaming for the ball for a definite try but out of nowhere Jonathon Smith sniped the ball out of donabie’s hands and dived over the line for the last try of the game which was converted and the final whistle went.

Man of the Match to Alex Hind due to a game winning performance who played with 100% intensity from start to finish.

I would like to say my thanks to everyone this season at Novos, the seconds have been truly immense and it has been a privilege to play and captain you this season. I'd like to say thanks to Addy for the time he has put in especially as he has taken on actually making sure a team makes it to take the field every week because on the few times it fell to me to do I either had no strips or no players!!

A big congratulations to everyone and let's all stick together to take on the Candy league next season.

I wish good luck to Ashington as they continue the fight to avoid relegation and hope that medicals grow a set of cojones and actually play them this weekend instead of pussying out and taking the points.

Great game and great season, thanks lads.

Dirty Diggle