Sun 4 Dec 2022
Hornets Ladies welcomed Melksham Ladies to the “Nest” for this Sundays league game. Melksham sitting at the top of the league and the teams having never played each other before it was going to be a challenge and an interesting afternoon of rugby.
Following the kick off early Hornet nerves were settled as Sophie Beckham picked up a bouncing ball and cut through the advancing Melksham attack line and slipped a pass to Paige Hoddinott as she took out the last defender, allowing Paige to score the first try of the game which Lucy Mager to convert. This was followed by an individual run by Mager who scored in the corner. It was at this point Melksham began to play their brand of rugby with some powerful drives by their forwards, causing the Hornets to infringe. Melksham kicked to touch, won the resulting line out and had three drives into the Hornets defence before the gap appeared and Melksham scored under the posts and converted.
Hornets knocked on from the kick off, but disrupted the resulting scrum with a powerful drive, the ball was quickly passed to Lucy Mager who made a 20m break and drew in the fullback and passed out to Paige Hoddinott who was backing up to score and Lucy Mager again converted. Melksham then had a concerted period of attacking play and used three pick and drive game to good effect and despite some tenacious tackling from the Hornet forwards drove over to score their second try, bringing the score back to 19-14 and keeping the pressure on the Hornets. Following some aggressive driving from, Nat Stone, Cat Johns and Jade Grindal, Melksham gave away a penalty on the half way line. Lucy Mager kicked to touch and the resulting line out was about 10m from touch. A perfect throw in from Cat Johns and a clear catch from Phoebe Collins set up a a driving maul drawing in the defence allowing Lucy Mager to exploits the space and score her second try, which she converted taking the half time score to 26-12.
Half time saw some positional and player changes, but the pattern of the game remained the same Melksham using their forwards to make inroads into the Hornet defence, but again ferocious tackling from Ellen Worrall, Nat White, Katie Strickland and Beth Oldbury from the pack and Lucy Mager, Paige Hoddinott and Sophie Beckham, from the backs halted most the the drives, but there was a line break made through the middle but Tina Launder chased back 50m to make a try saving tackle and summed up the spirit of the team during the game. The first try of the second half came from a Melksham line out which Phoebe Collins pinched and this instigated two positive forward drives creating some space out wide for Ella Hutchinson to run into drawing in the last defenders and unselfishly slipping a pass to Jo Mahoney who was on her shoulder to score in the corner. Shortly after this Ella Hutchinson created a line break and ran in from distance to score under the posts allowing Lucy Mager to convert. Final try of the game came from a scrum on the Melksham 22m line where Nat White nicked up the ball at no8 following a drive from the forwards and broke several tackles before scoring under the posts allowing Lucy Mager to convert. Final score 43 - 12.
