Rams Bounce Back in Style to Take league and Cup Double

With scrum half James Brooks also impressing with a conversion and two penalties, also in front of the home crowd for the first time in a league match, it was the ideal way for Rams to bounce back from the previous weeks opening National League 3 South West defeat at Barnstaple.

Not only did they open their league account with four points but the win saw them retain the Berkshire Cup for the fifth time in six years to underline their local dominance.

“Compared to last week we were far more energetic, far more determined in crossing the gain line and we won the battle of the gain line in both attack and defence,” summed up Director of rugby Mike Tewkesbury afterwards. “But, I think that we have also got to learn to be patient, to put the phases together and have confidence with each other and say that we can put five of six phases together and the gaps will open up, but I don't think that we did that today as well as we could have.”

Rams showed plenty of endeavour in the opening stages of a match peppered by referee Mike Hudson's whistle and it was his decision that prop James Baker had not rolled away at a ruck that presented Bracknell with their first opportunity of points only for full back Liam Prescott to put his kick wide.
Instead first blood fell to Rams when good work from man of the match and flanker Aaron Hopkins, plus a Spike Chandler penalty to touch, had Rams back in the visitors 22 and from flanker Tom Bryson's line-out take and Brooks well-placed kick they made space for No.8 Ollie Randall to power over for the opening try on 20 minutes.

Brooks converted but with both Prescott and Chandler falling short with long-range penalty kicks following yellow card infringements by prop Jonny Mirtza and Rams centre Steve Bryant that's the way it stayed until just before half-time.

With Rams down to 14 men after a yellow card for Brooks, diving into a ruck and going offside, the visitors finally opened up the home defence off a five metre scrum when prop Ken Dowling crashed over and Prescott kicked the conversion to level, 7-7, on the stroke of half-time.
And they took the lead just seven minutes into the second half after all the early pressure had come from Rams before dropping a vital pass and giving the visitors a chance to clear.

It was a mistake on the left wing that saw Bracknell's skipper Nico Maybury steaming away with the ball before finding centre Ben Nowak on his inside to snatch a try against the run of play but which Prescottt failed to embellish.
But with Brooks back on the pitch he was able to cut the deficit to 12-10 with his second penalty eight minutes later and within two minutes Rams were back in front.

The scrum half was involved again sending fly half Nigel Gumbleton on a great break and with support from centre Steve Bryant and Chandler they neatly sent replacement flanker Kharbouch over for the touchdown.
Although Brooks missed with the conversion he made amends minutes later after Prescott had a received a yellow card for a misdemeanor and Brooks slammed over a gorgeous penalty from way out wide on the right wing to extend Rams lead to 18-12.

And despite Rams losing skipper Owen Root to a yellow card on 67 minutes and some huge pressure on the visitors defence that's the way the scoreline stayed until the final whistle.

“It was hard-fought definitely but we deserved to win,” said Root afterwards. “We bounced back and trained hard this week and put some things together as the opening weeks defeat was not satisfactory in any shape or form and we came back as a team.

“They gave us a good run up front but the boys stuck together we had confidence and belief in what we were doing and I was pleased to see that the boys bounced back and had the attitude to reap the rewards.
We knew that we needed a knew mentality today and the boys from one to eighteen did an important job.”
And what about that yellow card he received?

“Disappointed but I didn't think it was a yellow card. I'm not even sure what he pinged me for. I'll ask that question in the week,” he said.
One man reasonably happy with his afternoons work was young scrum half James Brooks who was watched by his whole family.

He said afterwards : “Every kicks an important one really start to finish and I was disappointed I missed one because it could have been the decider so I was a bit worried about that, but, I think, the last kick out wide on the right was an important one to take us six points ahead because that would have meant they needed a kick and their kicker had missed a couple of simple ones.”
And he was full of praise for his pack of forwards in front of him: “The tight five were absolutely awesome and the back row worked like hell all day. We had really clean ball today and they worked really hard because it was a very forward orientated game so we had to pick-and-go a lot we had to work our one out phases off the forwards and the backs didn't get much ball really.”

Rams: Chandler; Smith, Bryant, Amor, Johnson; Gumbleton, Brooks; Batten, Paxton, Baker; Root, O'Connell; Bryson, Hopkins, Randall. Reps (all used): Rowlands, Kharbouch, Clark.

Report By Steve Williams