Saturday 7th. March 2015
North 1 West
Birkenhead Park 71 – 12 Wilmslow
It was a glorious spring afternoon at Birkenhead Park's ground with some real heat in the air but it was still a painful afternoon for those Wilmslow supporters, well over a dozen of them, who had made the trip. The Wolves conceded 71 points and eleven tries in possibly their largest ever defeat in nearly thirty years of the league system. It wasn't as though the side was particularly under strength, even though it was missing three regulars all carrying shoulder and back injuries of one kind or another and another two for work related reasons. It would be hard to make a case though that their presence would have made any significant difference to the outcome.
Birkenhead Park have conceded only three losing bonus points all season in an unbeaten run at home. They started the day four points clear at the top of the table and thirty five points ahead of Wilmslow in sixth position. Right from the start of the game it became clear that it was going to be a difficult eighty minutes for Wilmslow, serving only to remind us of what we knew already, that the top three sides in this league are literally in a league of their own, far ahead of any of the other eleven sides. In the last four weeks, the Wolves have visited all three of them with progressively worsening results. Nobody was expecting them to cause an upset here, nevertheless the margin of defeat was still disappointing.
Ironically Wilmslow didn't actually look a bad side in the spells when they had possession of the ball and played to their strengths, certainly stretching the Park defence more than once. In comparison to their opponents though, they were just seriously underpowered and unable to cope with the intensity and accuracy of Birkenhead Park's play. Park's set piece contained a mature experienced front row, which was up against opponents three out of four of whom were barely twenty years old each and one James Venables making his debut. It became increasingly dominant in the latter stages, especially when Robert Taylor was wisely substituted.
Even Mike Clifford couldn't get close to their ball in the lineout and their organisation and ability to drive forward and to retain possession was of a different order to anything Wilmslow could do. The suspicion is that the Wolves realised early on that the game was beyond them and that the height of their ambition became to glean a bonus point from scoring four tries. They did manage two and weren't so far away from getting another two but with that mind set it became inevitable, particularly in the last quarter, that the defence would, at least, stand off or in a worst case scenario go completely awol in the face of large Park forwards hurtling down on them like a herd of stampeding buffalo.
The tone of what was to come was set straight from Park's kick off which was pin point accurate to ten metres allowing one of their forwards to get underneath it and to pluck it out of the sky, something, which Wilmslow in comparison couldn't get close to managing all afternoon. Accurate starts and restarts are a key component of today's game but can only be achieved with a sound kicking technique honed from practice and persistence. The Wolves were immediately penalised, the ball was put into touch about five metres from the Wilmslow line and a perfect catch and drive executed. One minute played, 7 – 0, simple and easy peasy.
Five minutes later, Wolves winger Lawrence James was flattened quite legitimately in mid field as he took a pass, a penalty was conceded and Park administered a similar catch and drive lesson, this time adding a bit of variation by peeling off towards the posts, presumably to make the conversion easier for their kicker.
From the restart, Park recycled a couple of times before putting the ball deep into Wilmslow territory. The Wolves managed to clear but Park took the ensuing lineout and slick handling produced their third try. Only ten minutes played, 19 – 0, game maybe not quite over yet but heading fast in that direction.
The Wolves then had their best period of the game, exerting fifteen minutes of pressure on the Park defence, which they didn't like at all, consequently coughing up a series of penalties enabling the Wolves to maintain some momentum. There were powerful runs from Vili Tuipoluto, Adam Taher and Harry Patch. At this stage, the Wilmslow scrum was also causing their opponents problems, on one occasion tight head Robert Taylor delightfully popping his man skywards, like squeezing pips from an orange. It couldn't last, of course, but another decisive powerful run from Patch took him to a yard of the line where he was able to get the ball away to the unmarked Ollie Wilkinson outside him for a Wolves try.
Park's response was immediate and uncompromising. The last thing Wilmslow needed to do was to kick the ball back to them with a poor clearance, which, of course, was what they did. Hard running took them to the Wolves line where they earned a penalty and a quick tap earned them try number 4. A minute later from the restart, they were running at the Wolves again for their fifth touchdown.
There was no more scoring up to half time and Wilmslow then started the second half gamely, going close until the ball fell loose as they tried to release their wide runners. Inevitably though Park resumed control and after ten minutes scored twice from attacking lineouts. Briefly the Wolves responded when a wide move from left to right was finished off by full back Ben Day for their second try. There was a dangerous looking run from Vili but no support for him to offload to, Legin Hotham showed a bit of class and Ed Stobart did his best to inject a bit of momentum into the Wolves play but as the game entered its last quarter it really just became a procession for Park's forwards who by then were totally in charge.
Park's try scorers were in order flanker Robert Doolan, No. 8 Dave Ibbotson, scrum half Sam Chidley, winger Jack Lavin, flanker Ollie Mabbot, second row Lawrence Thomas, centre Danny Rich, Ibbotson, Rich and Thomas again and finally player coach Martin O'Keefe. Dave Hall converted eight of the tries.
On a more hopeful note, all the remaining Wolves' fixtures look winnable, providing they can pick themselves up from the trauma of Birkenhead Park and Kirkby Lonsdale and get their battered bodies, ego and confidence back into a positive frame of mind.
Match report by David Pike.
