Wade philosophical after loss to Lymm
MACCLESFIELD ............ 15 LYMM ............................... 38
BOTH teams had come into this game on good form; with Lymm in second place and Macclesfield in sixth, after five consecutive wins.
The 3G surface at Crouchley Lane has helped the Lymm team to develop a style of rugby, and skill sets, that suit a fast-track; running out onto the firm and dry Priory Park pitch, for the warm-up, will have filled them with confidence.
Lymm had 100 per cent of the possession for the first five minutes, but Macclesfield’s determined defence was fully demonstrated by two crunching tackles from Captain Harry Oliver, standing-in for injured brother James for the day.
For the second time, Macclesfield were penalised at the ruck, which presented the first score of the day for number 15 Cormac Nolan.
After the restart Macclesfield went through a period of good possession until they were stripped in the tackle, and whilst Lymm put together a series of attacks they couldn’t breakdown the Macclesfield defence.
When the home team did get their hands on the ball again, Terence Babarinsa spun out of a tackle taking a good curving line, Harry Oliver, at full speed, switched the direction, but in the process of the scissors-move he caught the leg of team-mate Jennings, and collapsed into an explosive tumble.
From the scrum Lymm attacked left, their 12 drew the Macc defence before feeding the Left Wing who had come from deep, at full pace, to take a short ball, leaving a big gap to run into.
He made 25 yards before being tackled, and from the ground he popped the ball up to the Right Wing, Nathan Beesley, who had taken a support line from deep.
Beesley side-stepped the first defender before an arcing run, which created an overlap, he didn’t need, to score by the posts.
From the restart Lymm were quickly back into attack again, forwards and backs making quick yards.
The ball was chipped forward, finding Sam Broster isolated, with three players on-top of him, forcing him into putting the ball into touch.
Lymm threw to the back, and a good driving maul got them to within five metres, Tight-head, Matty Hand, broke from the maul beating the first defender to score; it was 0-17 after 25 minutes.
Up until this point Macclesfield had not been given the opportunity to put a meaningful attack together, but after the restart they went through several phases until Charlie Attis chipped to the corner for Right Wing Lloyd Smith-Coates.
Both he and the covering defender missed the ball, but as they jostled, on the ground, over the tryline, the big Macclesfield winger managed to get his hand on the ball.
The referee signalled for a try, but the Lymm touch judge, signalled that the Macclesfield player’s feet were in-touch.
After some deliberation the referee awarded a five metre lineout to the visitors.
There are some esoteric vagaries within the laws of rugby, and this appears to be one of them.
According to World Rugby, if an attacking player’s feet are in touchin-goal, but they are not holding the ball, they are not in-touch, and as such a try is scored.
Lymm cleared their lines, but Macclesfield ran it back from deep, first moving it right, then quickly to the left where Seb Pemberton found space out wide, he was tackled in the five metre area, but two phases later would give James Cross sufficient space to barge over, for a 5-17 score-line.
Macclesfield now had the bit-between-theirteeth, attacking deep into the Lymm half, a swinging arm from the Lymm five, stopped the attack, but sent the player to the sinbin.
Macclesfield’s lineout had been 100 per cent successful, to this point, and in the absence of James Oliver and Phil Laing, with every throw going to Seb Pemberton; as such it wasn’t hard to guess for Lymm, they just had to get their timing right, which they did, escape number one.
However, the referee penalised them again, and after the kick, Macclesfield would have another five metre lineout.
Again it went to Pemberton, but this time the referee deemed it not straight, escape from jail number two.
Macclesfield were determined to get another score before the break, with another penalty awarded 40 metres out Attis chose to go for goal making it 8-17 at halftime.
Macclesfield started the second half the way that they had finished the first, pressing hard to get back on level terms, they put together numerous phases until they were battering the line to get over.
Rhys Davies drove for the line but was stopped just short, although the referee immediately blew for being held-up.
It didn’t look like the ball was either held-up or over the line.
The chance was gone but Macclesfield attacked again from the goal line drop-out, with Brendan
Berry almost getting in at the corner.
Macclesfield would attack again, but spilt the ball in Lymm’s 22; Lymm were quick to react, scooping up the ball and spinning it out to the Left Wing through Forwards and Backs.
Paddy Jennings flew up the wing before feeding Full Back Cormac Nolan, his speed and footwork turned the last defender inside-out; it was a score totally against the run of play that gave Lymm a healthy lead of 8-25.
In the build-up to the try Rhys Davies had been over committed to a tackle, which the referee deemed warranted carding, even though the try had been scored, it had gone from bad to worse for Macclesfield.
It quickly got even worse for the Macc lads, Lymm ran the ball out from their 22 following a scrum from the restart, and though the attack looked as if it had been stiffled, an inside, no-look pass, to no one, found the hands of a Lymm player in support, they flooded through the middle of the park, the final pass going to Jennings on the left wing, who made shortthrift of the last defenders to score again.
Lymm kept the pressure on, spending a protracted period deep in the home side’s territory Macclesfield couldn’t get their hands on the ball, and when they did, it only resulted in setting Lymm up for a lineout attack.
The, very lively, Lymm Left Wing, joined the line at an angle, beating three players, and when he was half-tackled still made ground, leaving a short trundle for one of their Forwards to go over.
It was a difficult call for the referee, but he gave a five metre scrum to Lymm, it would make no difference as Scrum Half Ben Simpson picked up from the base, and ran around the blind-side to finish under the posts, un molested.
Macclesfield attacked with real positivity from a lineout after the restart, first down the middle before switching left, then right; a grubber kick from Attis looked like Sam
Brown might go over, but it was just a little heavy. Macc fielded from the lineout and were back on the attack. From a scrum 35 metres out, Brendan Berry picked up and fed Louis Singleton, now at 9, who in-turn gave a slick pass to Harry Oliver at pace, he beat the first man before slipping the ball back inside to Berry to go over for the score.
There were no more changes to the scoreboard, in what had been a very competitive contest. Whilst things had gone against Macclesfield, on a couple of scoring occasions, Lymm had thoroughly deserved their 38 points. Lymm’s 3G playing surface has helped their squad to play a fast running game that they are able to deploy very well, once a gap has been created. What was disappointing in the second half, was that as the game progressed the Macclesfield defence was not able to snuff-out those attacks, before they developed; as a consequence Lymm gained more confidence to ‘have-a-go’ from anywhere on the pitch.
Head Coach, Ben Wade, was naturally disappointed with the loss, but philosophical in his response: “We could have played better, but we were beaten by a better team on the day. There was too much individual play at times, which meant that players lost some structure, and unlike Lymm, we didn’t support as well as we should have.
“We’ll all be looking at the game in detail, to highlight every area that we can improve upon.”
Next Saturday is a fallow week, with the following Saturday finishing-off the first half of the season at Wirral, who sit two places below Macclesfield in ninth position.
Wade will be taking it very seriously, with the target of starting a long, winning-streak, helped by the return of several key players.
At the top of the table it looks likely to be played out between Blackburn and Lymm, but with Lymm having the return fixture on their 3G pitch, they are probably in the box-seat.