On the occasion of the annual ladies lunch Olney entertained West Bridgford for the first time. Their travelling band of supporters were surprised and impressed by the spectacle that greeted them in the shape of 90 or so ladies in various festive attire sitting down for a well organised and jolly occasion as the season of goodwill was very much in evidence.

Olney started the first half with the sun behind them and, as in previous weeks, were keeping the scores level showing promise in attack and strength in defence, so after 20 minutes it was anyone’s game. One or two missed tackles and a few unnecessary penalties by the home side put themselves under pressure on occasions which gave West Bridgford a slight advantage so it was probably deserved when they scored the first try midway through the half. The Olney side were not giving up though and good work by prop George Stanton (who is looking more like his old self week by week after a long injury layoff) turned over the ball and led to a spell of play in the West Bridgford 22. A missed penalty attempt was all they had to show for this though. With the sides still evenly matched, Olney worked their way to within 5 metres of the line but West Bridgford managed to dislodge the ball and set off on an ambitious run from deep. The ambition was well rewarded with their winger scoring in the corner with the last play of the half. 0-10 at the break.

The early stages of the second half seemed a little short of action but this was to change after a missed touch kick fell into the wrong hands from an Olney point of view and the ball was shipped wide across the field for another try to West Bridgford wide on the right. This seemed to galvanise them as a side and realising they had just got the upper hand, started to apply more pressure on the Olney defence. Unfortunately this led to a few mistakes and further tries to follow. One wide on the right, one from a catch and drive at the lineout and another when a loose ball at the base of a ruck was picked up and ran leaving the backs with an overlap on the left to exploit. This took the score to 34 and the game seemingly out of sight for Olney but an interception from Ollie Betteridge to score under the posts made the final score 7-34.

Again Olney played well for much of the game but, as in other matches this season, the side that made fewer mistakes came out victors on the day. West Bridgford, by their own admission, didn’t do anything fancy but did the basics reasonably well and came out on top. The ladies carried on with their festivities, the carol singers made their way through the bar and at least one team went home happy. The ladies lunch raffle was a success and was able to make a considerable donation to research into bowel cancer, a charity which has quite a significance within the club.