The colts made the trip up the M1 to Leicester along with a few thousand Saints fans for the first of their back to back cup games this weekend. Some crazy EMRFU scheduling forcing them to stretch the squad to the limit to put two teams out in a Saturday and Sunday National Cup fixtures.

The home side started well, forcing the Blues back in their own half, their knowledge of the pitch and conditions kept them well ahead on territory and possession. The Blues were hardly able to get a foothold in the opposition half for the first period. The Leicester side kept coming but the Blue wall held firm, superb defensive efforts from Josh Beal and Sam Martindale in the centres with good tackling from the back row stopping any tries. Eventually the defensive effort wore Kettering down and the home side chose to kick a 3 point penalty.

That was how it remained at half-time: 0:3

Turning around after half-time Kettering were again struggling to gain much possession and maintain their footing on the boggy surface. Much of the second half was played in the Leicester half but on the few occasions they entered the Kettering half they did score some points from two penalty kicks and pulled out a 9:0 lead.

Kettering were still well in the game however and a loose ball was kicked through and chased by Sam Martindale who was pulled back of the ball with the try line begging, play on waved the referee however much to the frustration of the visiting support.

The final 15 minutes again saw Kettering pressing hard into the Leicester teams 22 and Justin Leung went over by the right touchline only to be given as touch-in-goal and Forest were able to clear from the 22 drop out.

Final score 9:0.

The coaches remarked on some great defensive sets especially in the first half which kept Kettering in the game. However we were unable to play the conditions and pitch to our advantage as well as the home team in the second half.