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REPORT | Blues battle to Scottish win
Bedford Blues made it four bonus point victories on the spin thanks to a brave and battling performance against London Scottish for a much needed 26-7 away success.
It wasn't vintage, far from it in fact, but sometimes the points are the most important thing at the end of the day. The conditions were more than testing, a deluge of rain throughout resulting in countless scrums, handling errors and a real stop-start affair.
But as captain, Alex Day spoke about in his post-match interview, Blues are now more than just one dimensional as they stuck in the fight and picked their moments to strike.
Day said: "We had to adapt our style, which I think we did brilliantly. It was probably a very un-Bedford like performance but it shows the development of where we're at. We knew it would be tough away from home in these conditions.
"We have a lot of senior players in this group who have been together a while and we understand how Bedford want to play, and we're grinding out these sorts of games now. We're in a great spot, we asked for five points and we got them so a good weekend.
"We're on a good run but we'll come in on Monday with the same ambition, look at Caldy who are also doing well. It's a good place to be and long may it continue."
It was a weird performance in that Blues went from the sublime to the ridiculous right throughout the game, with their trademark familiar attacking intent cancelled out by a multitude of lineout failures and handling errors. On another night it may have cost them, but like a great boxer, they kept picking themselves up and griding down their opponents.
The only try was a beauty as Tommy Herman smashed into the Scottish defence and gave a classy offload to send Ryan Hutler in the clear. While that was magic, it was about the only time Blues kept the ball in the opening salvo and the hosts struck back for 7-7 at the break.
Again, it wasn't perfect in the second half, but when you consider Blues only managed four points in this fixture last year - an 80th minute penalty a real get out of jail free performance - this was a much more composed effort.
Herman got himself on the scoresheet just before the 50 minute mark with an almighty carry to the line from close range.
Blues were indifferent at the maul throughout but they saved their best attempts for last as October's Player of the Month, Rory Ward peeled off it to sprint home from 25m, then James Fish made the numbers game count when Scottish had 14 on the field.
It sets up an almighty battle with Caldy under the lights next Friday, with the Wirral side yet to host Worcester this weekend. One thing's for sure regardless of that result, it'll be a battle between two od the top four at Goldington Road. Buy your tickets here and support your team.
Player of the Match, Ward added: "Our fight showed how together we are. When the conditions are like this, and not much rugby is played, it all comes down to mentality - and our mentality was perfect."
