Sheffield Hillsborough Hawks vs Hemel Stags
Full time score 58 - 12
Stephen Marshall, Kieran Dixon, Mustafa Ali, Courtney Watson, George Stevens, Cameron Furlong, Stephen James, Jack Kavanagh, Tom Grange, Warren Grange, Callum Hurley, Connor Boyd-Barnes
Despite what seemed like a full squad at the Thursday training session, Stags could only make 12 players available for this weeks trip North (This small number included Connor Boyd-Barnes who is in the process of making a most welcome return from a long term knee injury).
With only 12 players the club started with a man short and no substitutes, when facing a full squad opposition who were able to simply roll fresh players on and off the pitch at will.
Despite the obvious disadvantages between the two teams Stags started well and fully contested the early phases of play; indeed after only 3 minutes they kicked forward from their own scrum and the speedy Kieran Dixon was able to beat the defenders in a straight foot race, re-gather the ball and rush in for the first score, which he also successfully converted.
Sheffield came back strongly and took full advantage of a number of wastefully conceded penalties that were gifted to the opposition by Stags. Three times in a row quickly taken running penalties resulted in prompt scores, which were all successfully converted. (18:6 after 20 minutes).
Things went from bad to worse for Stags, who suffered a further injury to a player who was forced to remain on the pitch for a considerable period rather than simply being substituted, this brought the side effectively down to 11 Vs 13.
After 36 minutes Stags had a man “Yellow carded” and were so down to 10 Vs 13 for 10 minutes and started the second half with a massive player disadvantage, which was revealed all too graphically by a regular succession of tries that were delivered by the rampant home side.
The final score was not really relevant, as the contest was basically a miss-match due to the huge player imbalance, but full respect to Sheffield Hawks who produced a good display of competent plays throughout the match and never offered their opponents any favours (Exactly as the game should be played within this competitive league), well done Sheffield Hawks!
The Stags players present today should take pride in their own individual and team performances under such difficult circumstances, but having fielded such a limited number of available players for the second league match in a row raises some very serious questions, as the number of available and willing players is now at crisis level.
Half time: 26 - 12
Hemel Man of the Match: Stephen James for showing guts and determination as he played on after "doing the splits" ouch!