Bees go down, but not without a fight

The Bees recorded a resounding 15-33 victory up at Otley, but their victory was not enough to save them from relegation from National League 2 North.

The equation faced by the Bees as they went into the final game of the season was that they needed to secure a bonus point win, with Hull and Luctonians both losing and the latter not picking up a bonus point in the process.

Birmingham & Solihull delivered their part of the bargain in spades, but news that Luctonians had squeezed out a narrow 14-12 home win against Leicester Lions means that the Portway side will be plying their trade in National League 3 Midlands next season.

After going 3-0 behind to an early Stephen Depledge penalty, the Bees were pretty much in control of the game from that point onwards, dominating play in every department save the lineout, where depleted resources meant that the visitors had to start without a regular hooker.

Adam Canning got the scoreboard ticking for the Bees after just 10 minutes, jinking through the home defence for a well taken try which he duly converted. These points, together with three further conversions during the game, took the Bees’ fly half total points tally for the season to 302, just 12 points behind the league’s top scorer – Ampthill’s Joe Tarrant. The Bees’ loss will be Coventry’s gain next season.

Another prolific scorer for the Bees – Aquile Smith – bagged the first of a brace of tries after 21 minutes, finishing well after a break from the ubiquitous Rob Connolly. This was to give the athletic speedster a total of 16 tries for the campaign, the sixth highest in the league.

Otley turned the gas up, but the Bees’ defence held firm when their line was under siege. Although there then followed a helter-skelter period where both sides looked to play open rugby, the score remained at 3-14 as referee McGaffney blew the half time whistle.

It then took the Bees just two minutes of the second half to further increase their lead, Connolly crossing the whitewash after an excellent driving maul from his forwards. Otley quickly struck back with a try for centre Jack Mackie, converted by Depledge, after the Yorkshire men had won a scrum against the head on the Bees’ line to narrow the deficit to 10-19.

But with lock forward James Stannard in the sin bin for a high tackle on Aquile Smith, the winger took a scissor pass from Connolly to score his second and the all important fourth bonus-point try for the Bees after a bullocking break by the ever-industrious Liam Dunne. A 10-26 lead seemed to be enough and when Ian Briggs darted through for a try on the 74 minute mark, the visitors were well and truly “home and hosed”.

A consolation try for Otley late on, scored by replacement flanker Chris Gemmell, made the final score-line of 15-33 slightly less flattering to the Bees, but this was nonetheless a emphatic victory. Unfortunately the news coming through on twitter from Leominster was to make it a somewhat pyrrhic one too.

Teams

Otley – Kristian Sharples, Harry Hudson, Jack Mackie (T), Mike Coady, Alex Beaumont, James White, Steve Depledge (P,C), Freddie Watson, Jack Scott-Paul, Stephen Costello, James Stannard, Stuart Gregg, Mark Chivers, Ben Steele and George Burkinshaw. Replacements – Jason Moss, Harry Wales, Arnold Ellison, Joseph Armitage and Chris Gemmell (T).

Birmingham & Solihull – Jimmy Oliver, Dai Evans, Steve Johns, Rob Connolly, Aquile Smith (2T), Adam Canning (T, 2C), Rod Petty, Rob Greg, Ashley Scriven, Darren Forder, Chris Goddard©, Matt Spink, Nick Bingham, Pete Koziot and Stefan Thorp. Replacements – Liam Dunne, Mitch Lee, Charlie Ding (YC), Alex O’Malley and Ian Briggs.

Referee – Brendan McGaffney