The sun shone in glorious fashion on this fixture played away at Barnes in London although this didn’t increase the temperatures that were hovering in single figures throughout the game.

Barnes were the last of the ‘unknowns’ in this league with this fixture having been rearranged from the World Cup final weekend in October. The Newbury Ladies travelled down the M4 with nerves once again building despite a very good performance against the Army Development team just a few days before. The game was to be played as a 14 a-side game and with uncontested scrums.

Starting off playing into the wind and with the sun in our eyes the game began with a Newbury kick off. Once again the Newbury Ladies started the game hard and fast to stamp some authority on the game. After a few positive runs forward and some good hands by Newbury, Barnes found themselves on the back foot. It didn’t take long before our part time winger Hannah “Baby H” Gray, making her first appearance for quite some time touched down in the corner.

Newbury continued to drive forward but found themselves unstuck whilst mauling enabling Barnes to secure some turnover ball and begin advancing. The Newbury defence held strong as ever and despite these turnovers, also achieved by several Newbury knock-ons, Barnes were unable to find a way through.

The second try of the half came from our captain Laura Smith who, after a brief moment of confusion after a charge down in the try area touched the ball down for a straightforward try. This was followed soon after by another score through the hands of Emma “Mrs Rowland” Button who ran round the Barnes defence and finishing under the posts enabling Ashley Hunter to easily convert.

The half time whistle soon came with Newbury going into the break 17-0 up against the home team. After a brief half time discussion and taking the advice of our coach on board we were ready to resume the game with the wind behind us.

The second half started and Newbury seemed to have a renewed determination to close this game out. Barnes seemed to change their game plan and tried to drive holes through the Newbury defence but it held strong and they were unable to make much ground eventually resulting in Newbury retaining possession and from cutting out the errors in the first half the try scoring resumed.

The first for the second half coming from our Man of the Match Carrie Smith who crossed the line after some great handling and support from the whole team. This set the pace for the rest of the half and seemed to up everybody’s game.

Caroline “Cazney” Simm secured many turnover balls from the breakdown, Donna Gardiner once again showed some impressive winger like running skills through the centre field whilst our scrum half Emma “Gyppo” Newport controlled the forwards throughout the contact area.

Our try scoring marvel Gaelle “French” Marcassus soon scored for her first try of the half before our prop Kim “Rotty” Myers crossed for her touch down after some excellent play by the front 5. Hunter added the extras keeping the momentum going for the team.
From the resulting restart our skipper Laura Smith chipped the ball over the Barnes defence and, chased up by Claire Humphreys, we set up a passage of play driving forward and enabling French to cross for her second of the match. This tactic was used a second time and despite the play being more ably read by the Barnes defence the result was the same and French crossed the white wash for her third try of the game.

Newbury didn’t let the pressure off and continued to drive the game forward until the final whistle blew. This came after a ninth try of the game through the steady hands of Hannah “Tom” Ward who, after a great performance running the back line got her reward by cutting a diagonal through the Barnes line for the points.

The final score was 49-0 to Newbury. It was an encouraging performance from the Newbury Ladies who took away maximum points from this fixture once again ensuring their position at the top of the league table.