By Znoober/ Penelope
April 29 2004

After accepting my fate as being this week’s match reporter, I grabbed a pen and notebook and journeyed nervously towards the Exeter-bound chariot full of soon-to-be-drunken, lairy, ugly rugby fans. And so began my curious voyage into the seedy world of internet journalism… After the opening game (Bristol Academy beat South West Academy), we retired to the bar to see our new heroes, the Montferrand team, annihilate those B**h pretenders. So that was nice. The Exeter players were a little confused when we later started chanting ‘Montferrand’ as they came out of the changing rooms.



With one pre-match change to the team in the programme (Haag in for Hodge), the game got underway. Bris started well with a clearance to touch from Danny, but Exeter were soon awarded a penalty when a Bris player entered a ruck from the side. Allegedly. Thankfully Tony Yapp missed. The next penalty Exeter won, they didn’t make the mistake of going for goal again. Having kicked to touch, they won the lineout, and drove Bris back over their line. Gary Willis scored to make it 5-0 to Exeter after 4 minutes.



Some good work from the forwards and exciting attacking play from the backs got Bris into a position that forced Exeter to give away a penalty. Danny slotted the kick over bringing Bris to within 2 points of the hosts. Within 2 minutes, Bris had won another penalty which Danny converted to make the score 5-6 to Bris.



Joe El Abd gathering loose ball from two lineouts gave Bris some always-valuable possession. But Worcester-bound Siaosi Vaili soon put an end to that with a crunching tackle on one of the Bris players (umm… possibly Marko!).



In the first 25 minutes, Bristol’s defence had looked fairly solid. The backs were doing a good job of stopping Exeter crossing the gain line, and the forwards were putting in good hits around the fringes of the rucks. However, the 26th minute presented a few problems – Bristol missed 3 tackles in a row nearly allowing Exeter to go over for a soft try.



The first major talking point came when Joe El Abd was shown a yellow card. No one was entirely sure why, though! Having seen the video in the bar after the game, Joe was several feet away from the breakdown with no other players anywhere near him. Maybe he just looked big and mean, and there’s just no place for that in today’s game! Off he goes!



It wasn’t long until the second talking point presented itself. Exeter crossed for a try, but were quite miffed when it was disallowed for a knock on. I have no doubt the Exeter fans, players and management would say it was a rather dubious decision. I, on the other hand, say that not only was it not a try, but Bristol should have been awarded a penalty try and the entire home front row sent from the field. Maybe that’s just me though.



Just before half time, Exeter took the lead with a Haydn Thomas try. His Gus-esque break around the side of the breakdown completely bamboozled Hunty (although to be fair to him, he is a forward) and he went over for a simple touchdown. The missed conversion left the score at 10-6. Advantage Exeter.



Even closer to half time, Exeter scored again when fly half Tony Yapp was one-on-one with Hilts. Despite the skipper’s dynamic footwork and super speed, Yapp just about waltzed past him. He converted his own try to make it 17-6 going into the half way drinks break.



Within 5 minutes of the re-emergence of the teams, Bris came close to scoring after some good work by Beanie but Morgs’ was unable to hold on to a pass that could have resulted in a Bris try. But not longer after, Danny kicked a penalty to close the gap to 9 points in Exeter’s favour. Unfortunately, from the restart, Stylesy did well to get under the ball but only managed to palm the ball to Vaili who ran the 25 yards to the try line with comparative ease. 24-9.



Not for the first time, some quick Bristol handling created a good scoring opportunity, but one mistake from Bails saved Exeter from conceding 5 points. Luckily the ref gave Bris the chance for 3 points with another definitely-not-suspect-because-it’s-in-our-favour penalty. 24-12.



At this point, there were a few problems with the scoreboard. All in the space of 2 minutes, the score changed from 90-0 to 60-0 to 10-0. All in Exeter’s favour! Seeing the difficulty the scoreboard operator was going through, Danny kindly missed his penalty in order to avoid further confusion.



For the umpteenth time, Bris strung a few promising looking phases together then frustratingly made a hash of it at the crucial moment. C’est la vie as they say in Montferrand!



Just as I was beginning to think the Exeter pack were too big and powerful for their Bristol counterparts, Joe broke off the scrum (with the ball, I should probably add) and scored! Brett, now on for Danny, converted, bringing the visitors back into the game at 24-19. We assumed the score line could only get better for Bris when Viali was substituted at 38 minutes. Despite some last minute pressure, Bristol couldn’t get any further points. The only man to trouble the already troubled scorers was Haydn Thomas when he left Morgs and Sean for dead and crossed for the final try of the game. It was converted to leave the score at 31-19.



Exeter had a strong pack which just got the better of the Bristol youngsters today. The few missed tackles just happened to be crucial ones too. It was quite a contrast to the previous meeting between the two clubs at the Mem earlier this season. But it was a lovely day so we used the opportunity to say our goodbyes to the players who are leaving us at the end of the season. A good day, but not a great result. Not to worry though, we won at Wembley!