With a run of victories and improving performances last year, Mansfield come into this new season with the goal of continuing to reach as high as they can. This was put to the test against an excellent Paviors team this past Sunday in the RFU Community Cup. While the weather wasn’t great, both teams defied the conditions and ran each other ragged. The tries came thick and fast in the second half but, despite a late surge, Paviors were able to hold on to a slender lead to emerge victorious. While this was not the result the team would have wanted in the first game, they showed resilience to the end and will now know how to grind out those grim wins in the future.

Head coach Dave Woodcock knows his team will be disappointed: ‘I thought we made it difficult for ourselves at times but there was some really positive stuff going on out there.’

Mansfield didn’t get off to the best start, good opening passages from the visitors seeing them open the scoring within the first five minutes. A missed conversion saw the early score read 5-0 to Paviors.

However, the rest of the half became a struggle between the two teams as they both vied to take advantage of what would become valuable field position. The blue-and-whites were able to even up the scores as some good phases of play allowed a bit of space to be opened out wide. Natalie Garratt received the ball with some space but still a lot of work to do. She duly obliged and managed to run an entire half of the pitch to open up her team’s account. A tricky conversion was missed but the scores were tied, five apiece.

There would only be one more score in the first half as Paviors just began to take the edge in attack. Mansfield defended superbly, but were having to repel numerous waves of attack. A Mansfield line out was lost, giving dangerous territory to the visitors which they exploited well. A fantastic last ditch tackle from Cat Chambers saved a try but this was only a temporary fix as Paviors recovered well and crashed over the line. Another tricky conversion was missed but after an arm wrestle of a half, Paviors went in to the break ahead, 10-5.

The second half saw the weather deteriorate as rain began to fall and make both the ground and the ball much more difficult to play with. That said, the quality of the game wasn’t impacted at all. In fact, it became more exciting as both teams traded scores. The blue-and-whites defended superbly and were fierce in attack, exemplified beautifully by joint players of the match Bella Radford and Marie-Ann Battersby, who were relentless. Mansfield didn’t make things easy for themselves, sometimes not utilising the space as well as they could or missing the final pass that could have unlocked the extra space. However, the response to those missed chances was to re-set and keep battering away. This method worked as Amy Marshall found her way through the defence and over the line. A successful conversion by Laina Corah saw the home team slip into the lead, the two points giving them just the smallest of edges, 12-10.

The next 20 minutes saw massive momentum swings as both teams traded scores. Paviors used their possession and territory well, finding spaces to exploit and, despite the home team’s scrum edging dominance, securing their own ball at the set piece. They added three tries to their tally, two of which were converted, to take their final score to 29. Mansfield were building a bank of penalties and opting to take quick taps. This paid off as numerous phases of consistent pressure saw Marshall grab a second after bursting through a gap in the defence. In fact, the quick tap technique worked so well that the next Mansfield try came from this strategy too, Corah seeing some space after numerous phases and breaking through a couple of tackles. Corah converted both of these tries to take the home team’s final tally to 26.

Despite there being time left on the clock, the home team were just unable to find that final score, a bobbling ball signalling the end of one final attack and the end of the game. With just 3 points separating them, 29-26 saw Paviors victorious and through to the next round. While there’s no doubt there’ll some frustration at some of the missed opportunities left out on the pitch, there were lots of positives for the home side, some outstanding performances in what became a very wet and boggy game. The scrum grew well as the game progressed, the kicking game probed into the corners in ways that were absent last season and the perseverance in attack meant there was always a danger of breaking a tackle.