Bolton 30-8 Upper Eden

In the schools football rules and young boys and girls only turn to rugby because they are too intelligent, good-looking or big-boned to play the round ball game. The Bolton R U F C Junior Section do a fabulous job of producing players with the right attitude and skills to succeed in the senior game, but Bolton teams often have fewer rugby miles on the clock than opposition teams who hail from places where the 15 a side game is more a part of the sporting DNA.

There are upsides and downsides to all of this of course. Few normal rugby teams would have scored Bolton's fourth try, for instance, which started under their own posts where a rational side would have fashioned a clearing kick of some description. Instead a couple of passes had Will Bate racing clear to score the touchdown. On the other side of things, four penalties conceded at the breakdown in the first 10 minutes would have given an experienced team a clear indication of how the referee intended to police the ruck for the afternoon and they would have tailored their efforts accordingly. 70 minutes, what seemed like a hundred penalties and a yellow card later, it was clear that that particular lesson was still to be learned.

And so to the game itself. Bolton scored a very early try when Chris Turner went to ground in the Upper Eden 22 and the defence attempted a clearing fly hack out of his hands. The ball went straight to Jack Robinson on the Bolton right wing who caught it 15 metres out from the line. Time stood still. Jack looked left. Jack looked right. Jack then looked straight ahead at the try line, realised there were no defenders anywhere near him and did the necessary. Mark Doherty then kicked a penalty and a flowing move was finished off by Jonny Stanfield on the left wing. The sun came out and all seemed peachy at the Theatre of Trees, but then the game settled into the pattern it kept until the final whistle: Upper Eden's strong pack and well-drilled lineout came to the fore, denying the Bolton forwards the ball and frustrating them into a series of conceded penalties. With the UE fly half and coach pulling the strings Bolton's defence had a useful half hour workout, the shape of the game changing only briefly just before half time when the home team kept the ball just long enough for fullback Mark Doherty to stretch over.

So 20-0 at half time. Last week at St Benedicts Bolton conceded immediately from the restart. This week with the coaches' carefully worded exhortations still ringing in their ears Bolton conceded immediately from the restart. I got you babe. The game settled back into the aforementioned pattern and the crowd drifted to the adjacent pitch where the 2nds were beating Rossendale 20-19 with a late Rob Terry penalty. A brief flurry with 15 minutes to go saw the Will Bate try described above and another from Jonny Stanfield following good hands from Manny Tailor, but UE deservedly had the last say with a try from their excellent no. 6.

A bonus point win, then, with promising debuts from Ollie Ware and Ryan McCluskey and with four of the five tries being very pleasing on the eye, but the overall impression was one of a Bolton team with lots of work still to do if they are to get to where they want to be this season.