A good crowd came to Stourton Park to witness home wins for both the Lions 1sts and the Hounds over Sutton Coldfield, the latter by a considerable 71-point margin. Both games were a fitting tribute to John Hope, “Hopey”, who has been a constant presence as a teacher, coach, friend and Lions official for many years had sadly passed away the previous day. Many of the more senior players and a good number of those watching would have been coached or taught by John down the years. His many friends and the players of both clubs stood with their own thoughts during a well-observed minute’s silence.

To the match. John would have enjoyed the win. It was an ultimately comfortable 32-10 victory over gallant opponents who never gave up. A penalty from Tom Mitchell after two minutes was countered by a Sutton try almost immediately afterwards for an early 5-3 lead. However, a sweeping move from a scrum on 10 minutes saw Cass Brookes break through on to a pass from Rhys Williams and feed Will King for an easy touchdown, converted by Mitchell for a 10-5 lead. The Lions were never significantly threatened after that.

The Lions’ second try came two minutes after that, with a break from the lineout through Williams leading to a brisk passing move right and George Tildesley outflanking the last defenders to touch down. 15-5 with still over 20 minutes to half-time.

Some pressure came from Sutton who constantly pressed and competed at the breakdown throughout the game, with their outside backs prominent, but the game was effectively wrapped up shortly after Tildesley’s try when Scotty Langdon powered over from 30 metres wide on the right and moved to the posts after a cross-kick from Williams by-passed the cover. The conversion from Mitchell and a further penalty goal after 30 minutes left the home side 25-5 up at the break.

The second half commenced with substantial pressure from Sutton, compounded by the home side getting a little complacent and giving away several penalties. Sutton chose to run them rather than kick for goal and their reward was a try after 10 minutes to be behind 25-10. At that point it looked as if there could be a serious revival – the Lions gave away over a dozen second-half penalties – but gradually the home outfit exerted more and more pressure over the remaining minutes.

Twenty minutes from time they ended the scoring with a well-taken try by Cass Brookes. A line-out just outside the away 22 saw Rhys Williams give a show and go to break through, then showing fine judgement to put Brookes over for the inevitable conversion from Mitchell and the eventual 32-10 scoreline.

A good win was slightly marred somewhat by a serious and unfortunate injury to the arm of one of the Sutton players that resulted in a considerable wait for the restart. The win lifts the Lions further away from the bottom of the table and prepared for the tough games to come.

The Grasshoppers travelled away to Merit table division 2 leaders Old Yardleians 3s where once more both teams observed a minutes silence. The Hoppers then proceeded to rip up the form book as tries from Noony, Harry Bridgland, Chris Turner and Ryan Hadley plus 3 Hadley conversions produced a scintillating 26-12 victory.

Hopey would have been proud.

Match report by Jon Dews, pics by Sian Davies