J Bro take centre stage at Cottesloe ...
Perfects conditions awaited the game by the sea on Saturday; good job really given this place can be a nightmare later on in winter.
With the scene set of perennial finalists playing host to the newcomers, Cottesloe started with a plan to take the Brothers on up front, with numerous picks from rucks and one off’s that were matched evenly with the JB defence. The tackling was fierce from the start and importantly it was effective as the Cott runners were dealt with one by one.
An early open break from the Cott backline felt like s taste of what was coming, with swift hands and feet to take huge yards into the JB 22 with hardly a hand laid on them. The pace and accuracy of the passing was impressive and looked to undo the midfield early but JB did everything right in soaking up the pressure with solid defence, no penalties, good clearances and even a line out steal all included in the first 15 minutes.
Not scoring early on seemed to bother the hosts after the opening flare, as it took some urgency from the Cott pack to initiate a rumble from the deepest attacking platform in the corner under the clubhouse, resulting in the openside ducking round from the back of the maul to score after almost a quarter gone.
This sparked the Brothers into action taking the game to the gulls in the next quarter, with patient work to move up to the field. Scrums had been few but did look like a good battle and almost leaning towards to the Cott offensive but this aspect of play was going to feature a lot more after the brave decision this early in the war to take a scrum from a penalty decision yards from the home side’s line. They made this same decision three times as well, gradually gaining the upper hand with each engagement. The result from this confrontation was a further half dozen loose scrums, to see an eventual but ugly try. Is a try ugly to anyone but the opposition?
Further constructive possession by JB saw some rugby break out with their midfield getting in on the action, either heading straight into tackles or putting in a hard chase to put the back three of Cott under pressure. The latter worked netter as the JB10’s distribution was naive, forcing the fall he wanted to throw sending the centres into close quarter tackles when gaps did exist perhaps just the one pass on.
With JB taking the scrum ascendency and a little of the games momentum they finished the half a try apiece, 7- 5 down. This was going to be that test for the new comers to the premiership, stretching their fitness and vitally their concentration through to the 80 minute mark.
The second half started with the similar game plan from Cott, but already frustration started to set in when no scores came about, not even a penalty; credit to JB discipline, who with stood the onslaught to their own line for the first 5 mins, to make enough ground back for a kickable penalty, a successful penalty to take the lead at the seagulls away from home.
Cott now realised that kicking for territory was a good idea, gaining further ground from some astute touch finders, but was this only sending the forwards into more confrontation? Their successful shortened line out was used not nearly enough to help move the ball around, but it did help to creep up the pitch to make a rare penalty reachable, to retake the lead.
From the kick off it was a test of character from JB, given a badly placed kick off, leaving some heavy forwards in the midfield facing the hands and feet of the too often unused midfield sharpshooters. Thankfully for JB, the in-your-face defence was again successful in thwarting any ball movement Cott attempted, as the Cott big lads continued to force the upfront battles, battles they were losing confidence in.
Both sides were now guilty of lacking vision to take advantage of their opposition thinking, both sides needing to play smarter in the third quarter to gain a match winning turning point.
Cott now resorted to lazy tactics of slowing ball down a little too obviously, retreating onside via 9.10 channels, eventually annoying the Ref enough to give JB the opportunity to take the lead once more via a 3 pointer.
A great game with lead changing several times made a tense final quarter but no sign of a major customary shift in personnel. Neither side made any changes of note, which suggests either a lack of depth for such a close encounter or an unusual confidence in the team match fitness? A number of Cott players appeared confident in finishing the game on top, but the JB pack must have been running on adrenalin as they were very much still in the game as they went through the defence of their line for a good 5 or 6 minutes against a Cott pack that refused to go wide, deciding to creep forward inch by inch with every pick. Time then told and a double for the Cott openside totalling a full 60cm for both tries took Cott to a 17 - 11 lead into the last 10 mins.
Winning ugly is still a win and Cott were just about to do that, but this particular script wasn’t read by anyone from Joondalup, they don’t read scripts, they want to start writing them ... a final piece of possession for JB and fighting to maintain it, against a scrambling Cott defence was riskily played wide with the singular backs move in the JB repertoire for the day and lo and behold, a timely but very rare missed tackle in the midfield saw JB finish the job with a score in the corner on the last play of the day. A touchline conversion was the complete finish to a right old ding dong battle with an eruption of grand final proportions from the gathered players and the JB bench when it went over for the last change of lead.
Did Cott take the JB threat seriously, I seriously think future opposition need to as they will only improve as they understand premiership rugby and learn to play clever so as not to leave the big lads in the exposed in the midfield or let them go into contact on their own ... but with a little creativity and back row mobility the JB midfield could do some damage.
Second best result of the day was not having that damn Blue song sung …!
