Sat 1 Feb 2025
Maldon travelled to Basildon only to find that the pitches were waterlogged, so a walk through the picturesque village took us to a pitch in a local park, which was playable, so the game could go ahead.
Any team near the top of the table knows that playing a team near the bottom of the table can sometimes be difficult. This was what happened, as Basildon performed much better than their league position indicated & started the game very strongly, by outsmarting sleepy Maldon out wide, to take a very early 7-0 lead.
Maldon woke up. First captain Joshua Chadwick asked for the chip over the Basildon defence because there was a penalty advantage, fly-half Brad White delivered perfectly, 7-7. A couple of minutes later Chadwick took a flat pass to break through & score under the posts, converting his own try 7-14, with 10 minutes gone. Surely now, Maldon would demonstrate their superiority & dominate the rest of the game? This wasn’t what Basildon planned & the next phase of the game saw Basildon dominate, scoring another 2 unconverted tries, both out wide, on their left hand side. The Maldon defence was not covering the spaces well enough & Basildon took advantage of this, 17-14.
Maldon came back well & put some pressure on the defence, but Basildon defended with determination & kept Maldon out. It simply was not Maldon’s day, a last second bounce meant the ball couldn’t be grounded over the try line, and great Basildon defence held Maldon up over the line. Basildon also tried to break through the Maldon defence & made some good yards at times. Maldon knew that they were not at their best, but could not seem to play more effectively.
Just before half time Maldon moved the ball wide & winger Alex Davies continued his scoring from last week, to score in the corner, Maldon leading 17-19 at half time.
The half time talk was stern, improvements were needed & the basics needed to be done before anything more elaborate was needed.
The second half kicked off & within a few minutes George Alden-Smith was off for 10 minutes for a high tackle. Basildon took advantage of this & scored from a line-out, which Maldon opted not to defend, hoping for a penalty for an offside/truck & trailer infringement, which was how this has been refereed so far this season. But, the referee did not award the penalty & Basildon scored, 24-19. This upset Maldon & dissent to the referee resulted in a penalty at the restart. From then on Maldon were too concerned with decisions from the referee & this affected their performance. Basildon kicked a penalty, 27-19. The first yellow card returned, only to be immediately followed by a yellow to Dimitri Sofoclous, for a deliberate knock-on which was deemed to prevent a potential try scoring opportunity about 50m out. But, Maldon responded well to this setback, kept the ball better & moved down the pitch, allowing Brad white to score a converted try, 27-26, Maldon were only 1 point behind. Not long afterwards, with Maldon having longer spells of possession, disaster struck. Basildon intercepted a pass on the half way line & ran in unopposed to take an 8 point lead again. 34-26.
Maldon threw everything at Basildon,but being frustrated with the referee did not help their cause. The pressure told, eventually, Chris Mooney scored a converted try, 34-33, with a few minutes left. Maldon kept hammering away at Basildon, but the defence proved up to the task and Maldon made mistakes by throwing the ball when retention should have been the priority. Basildon held out for a victory few would have predicted.
Maldon have 5 more games to go, some against teams near the bottom of the table, so they must not slip up again, as the season so far has been very successful, and they wish for a high place finish to reward their efforts.
Next game is on 15th February, at home v Mavericks
MAN OF THE MATCH - Chris Mooney, fantastic work rate, and defence.
