November Caption Competition

Each month a photo will be added to this page. It is hoped that you can come up with a suitable caption to go with it; a prize will be awarded at the end of each month – good luck

Ok folks, there has admittedly been a slight lull in the caption competition recently but hopefully with the festive season fast approaching there should be some great images appearing

for now here’s two for you to ponder over and hopefully come up with a little gem!

to submit caption please email pinnerrugby@gmail.com

Protected: Training Sunday 21st November with Hampstead visiting team

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3rd win on the bounce: Pinner 15 Quintin 9

Pinner vs. Quintin

This weekend saw Pinner host Quintin for the first time this season, which proved to be a thrilling and interesting game for all involved.

Off the back of their great result the previous week, Pinner wanted to establish their dominance early on. From the kick off, they made their intentions well known. Smashing the opposition up front, they made sure that Quintin had no disillusions about the level of physicality they were to be facing. Owing to the intensity and weather conditions, handling errors were numerous, resulting in the forwards being able to size each other up early on. The Pinner pack made short work of the Quintin scrum, however, and drove them back with relative ease giving a rising lift to morale.

In the middle of the park, Quintin were trying to ship the ball wide but the mobility of the Pinner back row left them unable to break the gain line. Unfortunately, Pinner’s tenacity forced them to concede a penalty early on right in front of the sticks. Quintin took advantage by adding 3 to the board. Pinner then came storming out of the blocks once again, taking the fight to the opposition and reminding them they were unlikely to get a rest bite. The handling errors were in abundance and Pinner looked tentative in open attacking play, which led to numerous scrum times, which Hans loves. This suited the home side though, who stole the advantage at almost every defending scrummage. Attacking strongly, Pinner did so well but often fell at the final hurdle, which frustrated many players leading to further infringements. Eventually, a penalty was awarded to Pinner and gave them a chance to level the playing field, which they took through the boot of international man of legend, fullback Mark Razzell. Hero.

Shortly after, in what can only be described as a moment of madness, prop/hooker/man of questionable wardrobe choices Steven (Stephen? Whatever) Devine (sweet irony) threw the ball  in frustration after dropping it just over the line (the third time the ball had fallen from his usually dependable grip within the first five minutes), thus, not giving Pinner a try;  which unfortunately hit the referees head. Even though, on reflection throwing the ball in disgust of his own inabilities,  this probably wasn’t the best of ideas, as it earned him a red card and a stern finger wagging from Captain Reza Sibilant, who was playing the role of angry dad. Hobo accepted the decision graciously, and had started to walk off the field even before the card was shown – a long, lonely walk to the showers with head bent and shoulders slumped he watched the remainder of the game from a park bench. 10 minutes in and Pinner were down to 14 men. Actually, it’s probably more like 13 and a half because Razzell doesn’t take up much space.

A quick reshuffling of the pack and Pinner were fairing well despite their disadvantage. They were still dominating in the scrum and the breakdown, but Quintin were managing to hold them out. Not for long, though, as they were tiring and Pinner were hungry for points. After sucking in the defence, Pinner found themselves with lots of space outside so as the ball came out wide, Sibilant found himself with plenty of options. Of course, he didn’t take any of them because he never does, but he danced his way through the flailing arms of defenders like he was auditioning for the lead in ‘Street dance 12’ and crossed the line to rolling eyes of Pinner players. The conversion was unsuccessful because Razzell slipped on a wayward worm.

The rest of the half was filled with frustrating situations for both sides, as they failed to capitalise on chances.

The second half began and it was business as usual for both sides. Pinner carried on their advance and forced Quintin to make desperate tackles, but ultimately it was their own lack of clinical finishing that was letting them down. Shortly into the half, Quintin were given a kickable penalty which they took full advantage of bringing the score to 8-6. Shortly after, they were presented with another opportunity, making it 9-8 in favour of the visitors. Pinner needed to up the tempo.

After twenty minutes of trading blows, Pinner found themselves once again in the opposition’s half. In a moment of confusion among the defence, fly-half David Luiz chipped the ball past the gain-line, kicked it on again passed the fullback, collected and scored to put Pinner back in front. A wonderful individual effort and it definitely wasn’t knocked on.

Both teams were now tiring, as they had fought hard to keep themselves in the game. Quintin weren’t ready to give up, however, and upped the tempo to test Pinner’s resolve. Unfortunately for them, they were left wanting because Pinner’s defence held strong and with that in mind, there never looked to be much danger of Quintin snatching the victory.

Final score, 15-9.

Special mention goes to James Byrne who had a stormer of a game and also to Craig Lane who did something hilariously silly.

Saturday, 20 November 2010
Belsize Park	HWO	Old Tottonians
Old Merchant Taylors’	28 – 0	London French
Old Millhillians	43 – 21	Old Isleworthians
Pinner & Grammarians	15 – 9	Quintin
Royston	22 – 8	Uxbridge

Herts/Middlesex 2	Short Format Long Format
Team P W D L F A Diff B Pts Pts Adjust Old Millhillians 9 8 0 1 239 106 133 4 36 0 Royston 9 6 1 2 175 107 68 5 31 0 Old Merchant Taylors’ 8 5 2 1 216 76 140 5 29 0 Belsize Park 8 5 1 2 167 109 58 3 25 0 Ickenham 8 4 1 3 151 99 52 4 22 0 Pinner & Grammarians 8 4 0 4 174 202 -28 4 20 0 Quintin 8 2 1 5 114 157 -43 4 14 0 Old Isleworthians 8 3 0 5 124 185 -61 1 13 0 London French 8 2 0 6 126 151 -25 4 12 0 Uxbridge 8 2 0 6 105 247 -142 0 8 0 Old Tottonians 8 1 0 7 58 210 -152 1 5 0

Back to winning ways – P&G 1st XV 50- Uxbridge 10

This week Pinner 1^st XV ventured over Swakeleys Roundabout to Uxbridge RFC in what was possibly their most convincing game this season.

With the second outing of the Pelicans (Pinners ‘new’ Vets team) proceeding their league game hopes were high after their recent victory over Royston RFC and from the first blow of the referees whistle they stated their intention. After some poor handling by the opposition it was Pinner who took control in the middle of the pitch and with quick passing straight to hand pushed the ball out wide into the hands of Bernie Richter, who with a full head of steam cantered to the try line swerving the oncoming defence and popped the ball down for a fantastic start to the match, unfortunately it was not converted, the boot of Dominic Coyle not quite into action at such an early stage of the game. However, his trusted boot was more accurate only a few minutes later when Captain Reza Sibilant side stepped and baffled the defence with diagonal runs both left and right to go through to the line for Pinners second try, all within the first eight minutes into the game. Normally, at this stage Pinner usually find themselves on the back foot from the restart, but today Pinner showed why they were promoted last season and will be a force to be reckoned with this season; full of pace and quick hands the ball glided into the hands of Alex Goring running at speed to go through the desperately grabbing Uxbridge backs and drop below the posts. The three tries made in quick succession gave Pinner a massive confidence boost and had a profound effect on the opposition, who spent the rest of the half defending against powerful and clinical forward play.

There followed what could only be called high quality rugby from a team determined not to let the opposition any way back into the match. The ball was now in flight most of the time with breaks being made by Craig Lane, who on two occasions found that his head not only worked faster than his legs but also was to heavy for them – resulting in a comic like running action and falling short and being caught by players much heavier and slower than him!

With the forwards, Simon Whitecombe, Aaron Nicholas working extremely hard to put pressure on Uxbridge they found themselves driving over from a ruck and the ball moved through the hands of scrum half Sam Markham who with quick thinking gave the oncoming Reza Sibilant the opportunity to side step two Uxbridge players and dive over the line to the cheers of the faithful Pinner supporters and his team mates, Dominic Coyle converted the try. It was following this exhilaration that Pinner took their foot off ‘the peddle’ and their concentration waned. This, had in the past allowed for the opposition to score and yet again was the familiar pattern, poor handling and tackling brought the best from Uxbridge who now were given the chance to run with the ball, passing out to their winger who, despite a desperate lunge by firstly Mark Razzle then Bernie Richter crossed the line. These points now boosted Uxbridge and despite Pinners scoring advantaged, started to alter their mindset and fears of a come back were becoming apparent, a second try late into the first half brought the half time whistle at the right time; a team talk by coach Steve Woad was required to get Pinner back into the winning mentality. Half time: 26-10

With the mosquitoes now hovering around every stationary person, the second half proceeded to with what was going to be a real soul searching experience for Pinner, could they get back that exhibition style rugby seen in the first thirty minutes or was the late charge of the last ten minutes of the first half going to change the balance of play? Only time and fading light would tell.

Both teams were ready to take the fight to the other side once more. Unfortunately for Uxbridge, it was Pinner who took the initiative from the restart, deep within the oppositions twenty two the ball ran loose after a great scrum and driving Uxbridge back with ease; saw charging at pace, the hooker Stephen Divine following the ball (causing a reading of 5.5 – 6.1 on the Richter Scale within the Uxbridge area) into the corner with a very worried fullback looking over his shoulder and the ground moving around him, all he could do was to kick it out into touch in fear!

The resulting line out was competitively won by Martin Goodwin who daintily swerved a tackle to pass to Reza Sibilant to run in and score what was to be his hat trick try (something we will not hear the last of for some time!), again the trusted boot of Dominic Coyle pushed the points margin further in Pinners favour.

Heads were up at this stage and the team could smell a victory coming their way.

Making up for the first half comedy running, Craig Lane counter attacked running virtually the full length of the pitch after catching a hopeful kick from the Uxbridge scrum half to cross the line with two defenders making last ditch attempts to bring him down to the ground, giving Mark Razzle the opportunity to add more points to the tally, which he did. The referee had previously awarded a penalty to Pinner for the Uxbridge number eight coming in from the side during a ruck which, again, Dominic Coyle put between the up rights. With the light fading and a Pinner side buzzing with confidence the game was secure, however, there was more action and points to be had. Man of the match, Simon Whitecombe, along with Reza Sibilant who had both recently, represented Middlesex, led the way forward with powerful running and almost unstoppable pace broke through the Uxbridge forwards and drew in the backs which left a huge gap for Alex Goring to exploit and add more points to the ever increasing total. It was left to David Luiz to convert and take the score to the fifty mark.

This was a most impressive win for Pinner, building upon the superb turn around victory in the last league game, the next fixture against Quintin at home will be a hum dinger! Congratulations to all that played, a truly entertaining game of rugby.

Saturday, 13 November 2010
Ickenham	3 – 13	Royston
London French	12 – 25	Old Millhillians
Old Tottonians	5 – 37	Old Merchant Taylors’
Quintin	39 – 14	Belsize Park
Uxbridge	10 – 50	Pinner & Grammarians

Herts/Middlesex 2	Short Format Long Format
Team P W D L F A Diff B Pts Pts Adjust Old Millhillians 8 7 0 1 196 85 111 3 31 0 Royston 8 5 1 2 153 99 54 4 26 0 Old Merchant Taylors’ 7 4 2 1 188 76 112 4 24 0 Ickenham 8 4 1 3 151 99 52 4 22 0 Belsize Park 7 4 1 2 167 109 58 3 21 0 Pinner & Grammarians 7 3 0 4 159 193 -34 4 16 0 Old Isleworthians 7 3 0 4 103 142 -39 1 13 0 Quintin 7 2 1 4 105 142 -37 3 13 0 London French 7 2 0 5 126 123 3 4 12 0 Uxbridge 7 2 0 5 97 225 -128 0 8 0 Old Tottonians 7 1 0 6 58 210 -152 1 5 0

Pinner Pelicans versus Uxbridge 2nds (photos)

Pinner Pelicans ventured over to Uxbridge RFC on Saturday 13th November for their second fixture of the season, match report to follow, but for the moment here are some photographs of the action…..

Under 14’s complete winning weekend

Under 14s Middlesex Herts Div 6 – Pinner & Grammarians Vs Kilburn Cosmos

17 – 10

Bottom of the table Pinner hosted Kilburn Cosmos on Remembrance Sunday at their Hatch End home. Following a well respected two minutes, Kilburn had the better of the opening period and they went close twice in the first fifteen minutes, once dropping the ball when over the try line and later diving and touching down a yard and a half short. However, Pinner were winning most of the scrums and a lot of work on the training ground was beginning to pay dividends.

Later in the half there was some powerful running from both sides with Tyler Hone, Bradley Stevenson and David Wilkinson most prominent for Pinner, but the final ball failed to impress and equally committed tackling brought the runners to ground. Evenly matched throughout, half time was reached at 0-0

Rain began falling heavily in the second half and the slippery conditions served to open up the game and Kilburn drew first blood. Missed tackles allowed their number 12 to slide over in the corner for an unconverted try. Pinner’s reply was instantaneous with a thirty yard break by Bradley Smith which culminated with him offloading ten yards from the tryline to winger Adam Rees who skipped beyond Kilburn’s tackles to score behind the posts. Harrison Davies easily converted the try and all of a sudden Pinner had a lead that they were never to lose.

The game was beginning to flow from end to end but once again, Pinner’s skill in the scrum showed. Bradley Stevenson, Captain for the first time, picked up the ball from a scrum on the halfway line and set off on an unstoppable diagonal run that saw him go over in the corner. The range with a wet ball was just beyond Davies’ boot and the scores were 12 – 5. Kilburn were far from out of it and Pinner had to maintain their concentration levels. There were two scores in the last three minutes. Pinner’s front row drove the maul forward and the ball came to the hands of No 8, Tyler Hone whose 25 yard solo effort, over in the corner, sealed the match. During the final play, Kilburn were gifted a consolation 5 points but the day belonged to Pinner. Pinner’s David Wilkinson was named Man of the Match but there were many, many contenders in what was our finest performance to day.

Pinner Mini section & Kilburn Cosmos @ Grasshopper Festival – photos

Pinner Mini section: Under 9/10/11/12 helped make up teams with Kilburn Cosmos during the B Festival at Grasshoppers RFC.

Here are some photos