Demons lose narrowly to strong Brentwood club

With Brentwood 1st team undefeated and standing top of London 1 Darts knew they would be in for a tough match. Brentwood were a well drilled side and their game plan was to use their large forwards, especially their No 8 to break up our defence and then move the ball wide where they had pace in the backs to exploit the gaps. Darts defence however with Garrett, Ball and Roper in particular stood firm and in fact it was the visitors who scored first with a Mothersole penalty. This was followed by an excellent driving move starting from a lineout which lead to Harry Wilson being driven over for the opening try which was converted by Mothersole. As often happens when a team scores the opposition were quickly back in the match with a converted score of their own. Tom Tobin who has made an impact since joining the club this season was then yellow carded for not releasing a tackled player but rather than being on the back foot Darts scored through Jake Taylor when he glided through several tackles to score under the posts. Mothersole added the conversion. Play continued until a break from Brentwood was halted by a try saving tackle from Jake Taylor, unfortunately he was yellow carded for the same reason as Tom Tobin. From the resulting penalty the home side went over for a 2nd converted try.17-14
The 2nd half saw the Demons with their backs against the wall with player short and the Brentwood fly half knowing we were playing without a full back kicked the ball through and a nice bounce into his arms saw him score Brentwoods third converted try to go ahead for the first time despite a valiant effort from Tom Peryer to stop the score. Tom Mothersole then had to go off injured and the Demons had to switch their back line moving Roper to scrum half and Taylor to flyhalf. Before Darts had a chance to reorganise Brentwood took advantage and scored again. Things were going against Darts and although they had Lee Kernott and Billy Wilson battering holes in the home defence throughout a lost ball in the tackle was kicked through for Brentwood who scored their final try. Darts showed great character and heart as they pushed their way up the slope through driving runs from Wilson , Curley, Garrett and Jamie "Bird" Clifford. This resulted in Roper being involved in all passages of play going over to score two tries and converting one to leave the score a credible loss of 36-29
The grit and determination showed by the Demons was a credit to a young side as at 36-17 they could have capitulated and let Brentwood run away with it but now the return match in the new year promises to be an excellent encounter. Where it is difficult to single out any particular player two players who at very late notice and without hesitation said they would turn up were Matt Glenn and Richard Thilthorpe were our players of the day.