FOUR IS THE MAGIC NUMBER AS MANCHESTER PILE MORE HEAT ON HEATON MOOR

As is now traditional here are some quotes. Firstly on the subject of Four...

‘Four-membered rings’ may sound suggestive to the overly smutty minds of our readers but they are in fact fairly uninteresting chemical compounds.

‘Four Wangs’ has probably given half the Manchester U12s Mums a dizzy turn. What a disappointment then to learn that Wangs Jian, Hui, Shimin and Yuanqi were Chinese landscape painters of the 17th century.

And lastly, a bit of wisdom on the matter of heat...

“Ladies, make the normally mundane task of switching the central heating on a little more exciting by singing ‘The heating’s on’ to the tune of 80s hit The Heat is On by Glen Frey as you are doing it.”

It’s at moments like this I ask myself “What would Rene Descartes do if he was still alive?” He’d probably be screaming and scratching at his coffin lid... Firstly, many apologies for the lateness of this report. I’ve wasted the best part of this week trying to convince Mrs Statto that the fiddly predictive text thing was the reason ‘love you loads’ came out as ‘you have sucked the joy from my soul’.

With Steph back in rehab and the wife deciding to go on manoeuvres with 3 PARA, I’ll have to wing the match report (though obviously I can’t wing it too much, or I’ll go blind).

Nothing unusual to report weather-wise again, which got me thinking: What do people who work at the Met Office do for small talk? Pondering this, I trudged up to the side of Heaton Moor’s pitch. There was only a light skittering of Manchester U12s Rugby Mums on the ground, but those that had made the journey this morning were standing around looking like caffeinated meerkats who’d been promised a trip to Majestic Wines after the game. I looked across at the boys training and going through set moves. I was interested to see how they would react after their last outing. What lessons had they learnt from the defeat to Ashton?

FIRST HALF
Manchester kicked off and were swiftly out-rucked, but fought back and produced a strong attack seeing a Manchester player, released by a lovely pass to the wing, sprint down the line before being held up on the Heaton Moor try line. A few minutes later Manchester won a scrum against the head, the play quickly becoming a ruck, which Manchester also won. The player hovering at the back picked the ball and quickly passed in to the centre for a player to run on to and crash through the opposition defence to score the opening try. This week we had the added luxury of conversion attempts and the first one was duly taken.

Manchester again pressed after the restart and it took a fine kick by a Heaton Moor player to momentarily relieve the pressure on them. It didn’t keep Manchester out for long though. A pass from a few yards in from the line, across the pitch, found a waiting Manchester player who ran at a tight angle towards the far touchline before cutting in sharply, beating the defence for pace and ground the ball. Again the conversion was made.

Try three was a pure opportunistic one. A Manchester player intercepted a Heaton Moor pass deep in their half and forced his way through a couple of defenders to score. This time the conversion went agonisingly wide.

Heaton Moor came back at Manchester now and only a great retrieving diving save on the try line stopped the home side from scoring. Heaton Moor then forced a scrum in a dangerous position which Manchester won and the ball was gratefully kicked into touch. Back came Manchester and some fine teamwork resulted in the ball being fed into the centre from a won ruck and forced over the line. This time the conversion was good.

Overall thoughts for this period were that the scrum looked very solid and provided a great platfrom to play from, as was the attacking play, particularly getting the ball out to the wings a number of times. Manchester were very solid in defence when called upon, tackling well and not giving an inch.

Stats for this half are as follows: We had no lineouts whilst Heaton Moor had three winning one. We had no scrums awarded but we won three of Heaton Moor’s four. We were awarded no penalties but the home side were given four. Stats for this half showed that the ball got out to the wing four times and there was one breakdown.

Manchester 26 Heaton Moor 0

SECOND HALF
By the time Manchester had woken up Heaton Moor had scored a try of their own! Manchester piled more and more pressure on the home side as they went in search of the equaliser. One passage of play saw a lovely series of five passes out to the wing but unfortunately the ball carrier ran out of line and both he and the ball found themselves in touch. Manchester had a couple of great driving runs but couldn’t break down the solid Heaton Moor defence. Still the general play towards the end of the half was excellent to watch.

Overall thoughts for this period were that it was a scrappy half in which we were caught napping and gave away a cheap try but came back well, and but for some fine defending by the opposition could have scored in this half. However the dearth of expansive play and passes out to the wing didn’t help the boys in their quest for a try.

Stats for this half are as follows: We had no lineouts again whilst Heaton Moor had three winning one. We had one scrums awarded which we won whilst Heaton Moor had none. We were awarded two penalties to the home side’s three. Stats for this half showed that the ball got out to the wing once times and there were no breakdowns.

Manchester 26 Heaton Moor 7

In conclusion the match saw Manchester produce some good passing and some fine interplay between players with the backs being given special praise for their overall performance. Unfortunately we turned the intensity down in the second half which allowed Heaton Moor back into the game. To build on the positives we must extend the intensity and all the good things we do for the whole match.

Many thanks to Heaton Moor for another great game and wonderful hospitality.