Norwich Match 8th April 2007

So Norwich had come down to the area to play in the Lexus tournament, hosted by Old Albanians.They won the tournament so were heralded "National Champions".

They wanted a match to end their tour, so they asked to play us. They came down to our ramshackle of a club, with our rock hard pitches and dusty car park, to challenge a North Herts premier outfit.

With the state of the pitches, it was more like a herd of rampaging wildebeests on the Serengeti (even without Jonno) than a rugby match.

Norwich started well developing a 10 point lead, though in the 2nd half of the 1st half, Letchworth raised their game, the defence holding strong, and some good passages of play in the backs, and some good close support play from the forwards. Despite the good spells of play, Letchworth failed to convert.

The Legends were up for it , and were prepared to go out all guns blazing to take the lead in the second half. The team-talk was interrupted by the Norwich coach Hayden Cocker, who has just recently achieved 500 appearances for Norwich 1st team - in contrast to our own coach, who has just made his 500th appearance in the bar - who asked if the game could be moved to a softer pitch, as the Norwich diddykins knees were hurting. Awwww. There was not a less firm pitch available, so we put forward the idea of touch rugby, to finish the second half.

Some of our lads, and the Norwich No.8, didnt quite realise that in touch rugby, you not going to get very far running straight into people.

Despite the lack of rugby brains, Letchworth were the top side to begin with. With some good running from Alex Littlewood and Dave Hill, the yellows were racking up some impressive tries.
A slight lapse in concentraton saw the Norwich lads cross the whitewash on numerous occasions.
Coach Muddy Waters could could not resist the temptations of pulling on the what was a skin tight shirt, and showing off his self acclaimed Welsh wizadry. It all went downhill from there.

Norwich picked up the pace once again, with Hayden Cocker in the arena, and the speedy winger went in for a couple in the corner.

The game ended light-heartedly, and we hope to have another fixture against Norwich early next season.