Old Laurentians drop down as tough season ends with a defeat

The game summed up OL’s season in 80 minutes.

Caught cold early on and conceding a try inside the first minute, fighting back to reach half-time just 14-7 down and then allowing their opponents to stretch away and add four tries to one in the second half to put the game out of reach.

A fighting rally in the final minutes should have yielded more with Kettering pinned deep in their 22 but the finishing touch couldn’t be found.

It didn’t look good when a Kettering attack shredded OLs’ defence with barely a minute gone, a converted try the result.

To their credit, OLs dug in and levelled the score after 25 minutes with a top class try.

From a lineout in the Kettering half, a maul was driven fully 25 metres to the line, Ben Nuttall getting the touch down and Dan Price converting.

After 30 minutes, Kettering added a further converted try to lead 14-7 at the break.

The visitors started the second half as they had the first and it was their free running backs and fine support play that brought them two more tries in the first 10 minutes.

OLs hit back with a period of concerted pressure that finished with Ben Roach crossing to reduce the deficit to 26-12.

But the game was by now well out of reach and, to reinforce that point, Kettering added two further tries.

Their defence proved to be as solid as their attack was incisive when they kept OLs at bay in a period of heavy pressure on their line.

Newbold on Avon hosted neighbours Lutterworth at Parkfield Road in their final game of the season in Regional Two East Midlands, writes Phil Fereday.

Lutterworth were looking to finish off their season with a win and consolidate their position of second in the league table whereas Newbold were looking to get some positives from what has been an indifferent season.

Once again, the Bold were having to shuffle the pack and Dan O’Brien had to drop out before kick off while Declan George had to leave the field after 20 minutes after both having injured themselves in the pre-match warm up.

Lutterworth came out the blocks quickly and gave Newbold no time to settle and organise themselves.

The visitors scored a converted try within minutes of the kick-off and this was the start of a landslide of points in the first half as Lutterworth opened up a 43-0 lead by half-time.

The second half began with more changers to Newbold line up with the bench being emptied and it seemed the half-time break had not been wasted as the Bold started to put some phrases together and Lutterworth were being put under pressure .

Unfortunately, Newbold could not get that score and it was once again Lutterworth breaking out of defence to score twice more.