Away Day Blues

Two rare occurrences for me Saturday.

The first was me going to an away match to watch Ponty.

The second was watching Ponty play two weekends running.

It is only when you stop working them that you realise how much continental shifts really screw up your social life.

To be fair, since I have finished I have been making up for lost time .. there has been a lot of pubs and alcohol involved since mid December! I feel like I earned it by the time I finished!

So me and Dawn decided to go down to The Brewery Field in Bridgend to watch Ponty take on The Ravens. We always knew it was going to be a tough place to get a result, their home record has been pretty impressive in recent weeks.

All looked good in the opening exchanges, with the Ponty pack on top in the loose and the scrum, but Bridgend had a very dogged and well organise defence, and it was going to take some unlocking. Thankfully we did, with Chris Clayton getting a much needed to touch down. Ponty also took advantage of Bridgend being down to fourteen men, before the end of the half, with a Matthew Nuthall try. All looking well and good going in half time at 15-3.

I am not sure what happened second half, whether Ponty went to sleep, or Bridgend woke up, but Ponty were never at the races for almost all of the forty minutes. You can't win a rugby game without the ball, and neither can you score .. and we didn't. Slowly Bridgend chipped into our lead, and were trailing by just two points going into injury time ... you just knew what was going to happen next, but the manner in which it happened was frustrating.

Bridgend missed a penalty to touch, and then we were into "next time the ball goes dead" time. Ponty formed a ruck, all you had to do was kick the ball dead ... the scrum half kicked it straight to the Bridgend winger, who had a free run down the touchline .. some frantic and alas illegal defending gave Bridgend the match with the last kick of the ball and a penalty!

The light was fantastic for photography for once, and I chose this picture of our number seven, and Ponty legend, Wayne O'Connor for my blip as the best of a decent bunch this week.

These things happen in sport, fortunately results else where went our way a bit, and the top of the Welsh Premiership Table is rather tight to say the least.

I must admit I was momentarily distracted by a huge Jackdaw Roost towards the end of the game! Once a birder, always a birder!

More pictures of the game can be seen in this Flickr set.