The battle of roundway down: the blues take on bath once again.

It has been almost nine months to the day since the Blues fought Bath at Lambridge Training Ground. Last time they faced one another the two teams were neck and neck on the league table with only four points separating them- this time round is no different. The Blues are confident that, after following a rigorous preseason and a handful of challenging BUCS matches, this fixture will be one of the most contested ones they have faced so far.

When the two went head to head in February, it was only 10 minutes before Bath's centre scored from a scrum play. With a successful conversion, this put the Blues 7-0 down. However, although Bath managed to put some early points on the board, that try proved to be more of a phenomenon than anything else as they could not manage to get any more points on the board after that. The playing field was levelled when last season's top try scorer, Lilla Berry (Blue #412), made a 30 metre break before offloading to winger, Kat Vincent (Blue #428), who scored. With help from current skipper, Mel Morley (Blue #435), who made a seamless conversion, the Blues were put at a teetering 7-7 tie.

It wasn't long before Morley did the rounds again, scoring a try for her team off a penalty lineout on Bath's 5 metre line. It was all thanks to a successful game of Chinese whispers (credits Lucy McBride #433) which led Mel to believe that they were not going to be engaging the oncoming maul. They in fact did not maul and Mel took the ball. She saw a gap that formed in a sea of forwards as though she were Moses parting the Red Sea and she scored. 13-7.

The second half saw a wonderful trio of tries scored by some of our senior players, starting with last season's loosehead prop, Estelle Onwuka (Blue #423), who powered her way through the defence to put another five on the board. Another try from ex-captain and one of OURFC's most decorated players, Sophie Shams (Blue #400), followed as she took advantage of Bath's broken defence. And finally, our very own Lilla Berry topped it off with one more try in the final five minutes of the game. A successful conversion from Morley brought us to 31-7 at full time.

This year promises to be an equally stimulating and exciting game as the Women*s team grows stronger each week. Following the successful turnout of their premier home game against Brunel, we expect Iffley to be equally lively as crowds come in support of our Women as they return to Iffley for their second home game of this year's campaign. There will be churros, cheap drinks at the pavilion and Drunken Ferret, and free tickets!

We hope to see you at Iffley Road next Wednesday at 7pm!