Paviors RFC

This weekend Pavs welcomed Bournville RFC to The Stump in Round 19 of the Midlands Premier Competition. Bournville have aspirations of playing in the rugby Championship and have accordingly assembled a high quality side from near and far. The win in the fixture would see them promoted to National Two with five games left.

From the outset, Bournville grabbed the initiative with three tries in the first fifteen minutes to give them a 17-0 lead from they never looked back. Pavs played with their usual sense of obduracy, but without ever commanding enough possession in open play to really threaten the away side’s line. Set piece was well executed but play beyond this was often halted by strong Bournville defence.  Three more tries were run in during the last ten minutes of the half to give Bournville an insurmountable 38-0 lead at the break.

Following the break, Pavs again fell victim to early Bournville pressure with two more Bournville  tries being scored in the opening ten minutes. At this point Pavs finally got into the game with a succession of well executed plays that saw Alex Barton go into the corner to bring the score to 52-5 in Bournville’s favour. Minutes later debutee youngster and Pavs Academy product, Tom Davis was on hand to finish off another fine move in the other corner of the pitch. George Billam added the extras from out wide to bring the score to 52-12. Bournville added a further two tries to bring the score to 66-12 by the final whistle.

As usual Pavs kept going to the end, but came up against a side that is well prepared for playing in the higher reaches of the league structure. Both sides clearly value success, but the method of achieving this success could not be more different. One only has to look at Pavs 1^st XV today. Sixteen out of the eighteen players have played junior rugby at Pavs and worked their way through the age groups before progressing to the 1^st XV. For them loyalty and camaraderie is more important than any benefits that might be accrued from playing which is where the difference between Pavs and other clubs lies.         

Nige Youl

1st XV Team Manager

Hyperlink:

Hyperlink: