Our heroes visited Morley on Friday night to showcase a brand of free-flowing social rugby that would make the Barbarians jealous. Following a battering by Morley earlier in the season, the Socials were ready to exact cold revenge.
And cold it was. Wet too. On a heavy pitch, the reality proved to be rather less free-flowing. With a combination of challenging conditions and our heroes aging legs, a much slower, less crowd-pleasing game of rugby emerged. Morley quickly asserted their dominance, using their pace to exploit an overlap and score in the corner.
The Socials soon responded with a try following several strong forwards phases. Our strong and mighty forwards gained territory and won a penalty allowing Richard Hoyland to cross the whitewash after a quick tap-and-go.
In the last 5 minutes of the first half, the Socials were playing with confidence, creating several opportunities to test the Morley defence.
The second half continued in much the same way as the first. Jason Kay scored a try for the heroes early in the second half (the try was missed by the author, who was putting on his coat to escape the cold). After that early second-half try, our heroes were ground down by a well-drilled Morley side.
This author isn’t great at counting, but the popular opinion is that Morley scored 6 or 7 tries to the Socials 2 tries.
Special mentions to Nick King for arranging this match and for his hard work throughout the season, and to Neil who dominated at inside Centre and was chosen as Sandal man-of-the-match by the Morley team.
Many thanks to Morley for a great evening and for their as-always fantastic hospitality. We look forward to meeting you again next season.
Sandal Socials are always looking for Vets players. We play between 4 and 6 ‘proper’ games a season, and play touch and pass throughout the year. If you would like to join us, please get in touch. If you can play at prop, you are especially welcome.

Written by Karl Stringer