LEIGHTON Buzzard’s march towards the top of the league continued on Saturday when they left Northampton BBOB with a vital 17-14 win.
With Midlands 2 East South leaders Huntingdon & District winning for a seventh time in as many games, Buzzards did what they had to do and beat the Northampton side with a hard fought and determined performance – and a penalty in the closing stages.
As is the case with many of their fixtures, Buzzards made the short trip north to BBOB having not played them for a number of years.
They knew this was always going to be a very hard game as BBOB are always a tough team to beat at home and this game proved to be just that.
Buzzards knew they would have to take on their bigger opponents up front, and they started by taking the game to BBOB in the early stages.
Buzzards were unlucky not to opening the scoring inside a couple of minutes on a few occasions, but the home side’s stubborn defence was clearly up to the job of keeping their line intact.
However, they did give a penalty away and Dan David stepped up to convert to give the visitors the lead.
But that seemed to spur BBOB on and they started to play some good running rugby, managing to run the ball out more or less from their own line to score the first try of the game.
The ball was given to their flying winger Cantwell who touched down out wide, and what should have been a very hard conversion proved to be easy for flyhalf Haddon who converted to put the hosts in front at 7-3.
Having had probably 70 per cent of the play, Buzzards found themselves behind, but after some good running by the forwards the ball was put out wide to Ed Ratcliffe who rounded his opposite number on the wing to score in the corner.
The conversion attempt was missed but the visitors held an 8-7 lead at the break.
The half time team talk was quite to the point, with both coaches not happy with the missed chances that Leighton should have taken.
And with those words still ringing in their ears, the Leighton team came out in the second half wanting to put things right, and straight from kick-off they put the pressure back on BBOB.
And after one of their forwards was penalised for going off his feet, it was again left to David to convert another penalty to make the score 11-7 to the away side.
The game then could have gone either way with both teams trying to break down their opponents’ defence but with no rewards.
However, Buzzards did manage to get themselves close to the home side’s line, only for the hosts to give away another penalty which David again converted to put the visitors a score ahead.
That should have been the point where Leighton started to put all their pressure into points, but instead it was BBOB who came back at Leighton and it was after the visitors had given away a penalty that BBOB went for touch rather than taking the points.
And it was from the ensuing lineout that they managed to drive the away team back over the line, with hooker Diffy coming up with the ball to score.
With the conversion needed to bring the scores level, it was again Haddon who slotted the kick and suddenly it was anyone’s game.
With not much time left on the clock it looked as though the game was going to end in a draw, but Leighton had other ideas, and after a strong run by Ryan Fraser, Buzzards found themselves deep in the BBOB half.
And it was the hosts’ centre who gave away a penalty to find himself in the sin bin for his actions and leave David to add the three points to give Buzzards a dramatic late win.
It was a game that could have gone either way, but coach Alban Turney said it was good to get the win and sometimes you have to win ugly.
This Saturday Leighton find themselves away in the next round of the intermediate cup to Kenilworth.
