LOVE IS THE TONIC AS PIPER POINTS THE WAY

Burnham travelled to bude with a strong pre season regime behind them but little in the way of match fitness as only 1 fixture was able to be played as the other was called off. But with a sense of belief and 4 debutants in the side Burnham made the 1 of many long trips south to play bude.
With stu blakes late cry off because he was stuck in a cave which meant he had “no phone signal” Burnham had to defrost poor old Andy Clements to sit on the bench big thanks to him for showing commitment and respect to the club and captain, (a lesson to be learnt by others).
New debutants Matthew maka, matt Glanville, tom Chaffey, matt fear and matt Mitchell were all to make their debuts and acquitted themselves very well and made impacts all over the park.

With a slight breeze behind them Burnham set out with a simple and effective game plan of making sure they played all their rugby in budes half and not to try and burn themselves out too early. Burnham’s first set of points came from the boot of piper where he landed a penalty to take the score to 0-3, straight from the kick off Burnham went through a couple of phases before bude were penalised at the ruck area, quick thinking from piper saw him take a quick tap and shot through the back tracking defence and offload to the rampaging rich musket who didn’t quite have the hamstrings to go all the way but offloaded to matt love who scored in the corner. piper conv 0-10

Burnham worked their way back down to budes 22 where a serious of rucks saw young Hayden tuttiet skip past 4 defenders to score. 0-15. Then came matt loves 2nd try after a long kick from piper love chased the kick down and seemed to scare his young opposite number into dropping the ball, in which he gratefully accepted, picked up and sped in to score. piper conv 0-22
The try bonus point was then all wrapped up on the half hour with the try of the game which came from the backs, who with an honest assessment from last season did not perform to their high standards so with hard graft in training and new fresh moves along with faces they have a big point to prove and they proved it through this try. From yet another formidable scrum form the strong set of forwards who also had a complete game, the ball was spun out to piper who worked a move with new centre pairing rich musket and tom Chaffey and released a reinvented captain marvel Russ pike who smashed his way through the drift defence to offload again to piper who set matt love away to the try line but sensing he wouldn’t quite get there he passed the ball on unselfishly to debutant matt Mitchell who scored his first ever senior try. piper conv 0-29.

Feeling they would start to run away with it Burnham took there foot off the pedal and let bude back into the game where they scored a well worked forwards try to take the halftime score to 5-29.

At halftime new forwards coach graham buller along with head coach elisi reiterated the fact to stick to the game plan keep the ball firmly in their half and to keep things simple. But as normal Burnham’s old habits of switching off straight after the whistle came back into play. The kick off was not chased properly and gaps were left open for the bude flanker to come storming up the middle of the park where Burnham conceded a penalty. Bude kicked into the corner and after a series of rucks they scored near the posts and converted. 12-29.

With captain pikes stern words behind the posts ringing in their ears Burnham went straight back into controlling the game and pushed bude into the corner with shrewd kicks and strong running from both forwards and backs, Burnham were able to gain good strong scrum ball and again slick moves out back and some great interchanges with both forwards and backs saw vice captain mike hocking combine with Tim piper who went through to score under the posts and convert. 12-36
With the clock ticking down Burnham’s coaches were able to use the last 15mins to bring on matt Glanville and mike nash along with also making some positional changes. This was done so the coaches were able to see what they couldn’t in pre season. From another strong set piece by the forwards Hayden tutiett now operating at fly half threw a big pass out to piper who waited for an age to pass to kiwi who seemed to run around the whole pitch first before taking the pass he smashed his way through the defence and score under the posts. piper conv 12-43.
As the game neared its end piper intercepted on his own 22 to race in and score under the posts and convert to take his tally to 25 for the day and the final score 12-50.

What a great result for Burnham specially away from home plus to score 50 points in the manner they did showed that the training is paying off. But there are still lots to work on for the coaching team who will surely address these things at training. But well done Burnham and we look forward to welcoming st ives to the stag pit this Saturday kick off at 3pm.

Man of the match: Tim piper sponsored by the Brent knoll inn