Banbury Bulls travelled to Nuneaton Old Edwardians in their latest Midlands 1 West looking for their first away points of the season. Taking a competitive team with them despite the large number of unavailabilities and injuries Banbury knew they faced a tough task against an Old Eds side yet to lose at home.

With the weather taking a turn for the worse during the warm-up, it was on a slippery and soggy surface that the match kicked off. The initial clashes saw Nuneaton look to implement a simple, yet surprisingly effective game plan and the Banbury defence were too often caught on their heels. With pace on their wings, Old Eds looked to try and release them wherever possible and after a break down the Banbury left, some good supporting lines from the forwards gave the home side the opening try after 13 minutes. With the conversion successful, Banbury were 7-0 down.

The home side were to strike again within 3 minutes of the restart when poor discipline led to a number of penalties in the Banbury half. Kicking for the corner the Nuneaton pack drove over from a well-executed driving maul to give the home side a 12-0 lead. And things could have been worse had it not been for a superb try-saving tackle from full-back Peter Flemming who forced the flying Nuneaton’s winger into touch as he dived to ground the ball.

Excellent cover defence by Flemming and back row Dan Boys also snuffed out another potential home try as the Old Eds full back was held up just short of the line. With ten minutes to go in the half, the heavens opened once again and this seemed to wake up the Banbury side who put together their best period of attacking play. Despite the continued attempts by Old Eds at slowing the ball down by lying on the wrong side of the tackler, Banbury attacked down the right and Flemming combined with winger Carl Daniels to drive close to the line. Quick ruck ball followed and Daniels was once again on hand to take the offload from Boys and get Banbury on the scoreboard. Fly-half Mike Smith was on target with the conversion as the half-time whistle blew and Banbury were still very much in the game at 12-7.

The Bulls knew that they needed to score first in the second half to put the pressure on the home side, but it was not to be as Nuneaton scored a finely worked try after just five minutes of the restart. With the conversion going wide, Banbury found themselves 10 points down and worse was to come.

The basic errors that have plagued the Bulls season to date reared their ugly head and a simple missed tackle shortly after allowed the home side to get in behind the Banbury defence. A simple draw-and-pass put the Old Eds centre free and he cantered home from 20 yards out giving them their bonus point and leaving the Bulls three scores adrift.

The final nail in the coffin for Banbury’s hopes of a win came after just 11 minutes of the second half when the referee was the only person present to not see a blatant knock-on and the visitors succumbed to the schoolboy error of not playing to the whistle. This allowed the lively Nuneaton winger to go over for his second try.

To their credit Banbury did not stop probing the home sides defence despite now being 20 points down. But Nuneaton cleverly disrupted Banbury’s attacks with numerous penalty offences that the referee deemed to be too far from the home sides try line to even bother giving a warning, let alone a card.

With the game entering its final moments and Banbury still chasing the game, the continual slowing down of ball by the home side became too much. Whilst trying to clear a blocking player out of a ruck hooker Liam Stratford was penalized for reckless use of the boot and shown a yellow card. Banbury pushed for a second score right to the end of the match but the home defence held firm despite the visitors’ pressure. The final whistle went and Banbury were well-beaten 27-7.

Banbury look to return to winning ways back at Bodicote Park this Saturday when they entertain league high-flyers Old Halesonians. The Bulls will be hoping that some help from Northampton Saints stars Bruce Reihana, Phil Dowson and Shane Geraghty will pay off as they visit the club to take a training session this Tuesday 26 October at 7pm.