Rampaging Forwards Rumble Rushden

The final league game of the season saw the Blues rack up their largest point tally of the season (thus far) away at Rushden. The pre match talk very much focused on playing as a team, doing the basics well, keeping our discipline.

From the off Rushden played with a confidence not seen in recent years and rightly took the lead with a converted penalty just outside the 22.

Kettering stuttered and spluttered for the first 10 minutes (what's new) however once they found a rhythm the tries started to flow.

A superb driving maul from about 10m out got the show on the road (Alex Bailey) and was quickly followed up with a well worked back line play which created space for Ashley Marshall to use his pace and touch down under the posts. Saul Croxford slotted the conversions and the Blues started to pull away from Rushden.

The forwards had complete dominance at both scrum and line out however to Rushdens credit they never gave up. The half closed with 4 tries to Kettering and with Rushden being held to just the single penalty score.

A number of personal changes were made at half time and it didn't take long for Kettering to get back in the groove.

Numerous strong forward drives created ample opportunity for the pack to get over the line as well as creating the platform for the back to move the ball through the hands and also cross the whitewash. Whitehead took over the kick duties and landed a few beauties from out wide to add the extras.

The defence through the second half stood strong with a number of excellent tackles being made across the park. The pressure at scrum time had taken its toll forcing Rushdens to make a number of substitutions and ultimately run out of props resulting in non contested scrums and sadly reduced to 14 players having ran out of subs.

Blues continued to exert pressure at every opportunity and eventually ran out winners by 66 points to 3. A good performance that sets things up nicely for next Saturday's Referee's Cup game at home v Casuals which is sure to a be a good contest.

Having mulled over individual performances I award Calum Whitehead man of the match, he put in some great tackles which forced a number of turn overs, kick beautifully in difficult conditions and showed good improvement in organising the defensive. Well done!