in cool wintery conditions tonight at the big Fellas, Rovers entertained Toulouse - After a minute clapping just before the start of the game, in memory of the hugely popular Gareth Swift, fans were looking to banish the memories of a defeat against today's opponents, in the corresponding fixture last season.
On The field this week, a start for Danny Allan in the centre, was probably the only noteable change and with Jon Grayshon still not quite right, the starting back 3 again included Dane Manning, Jamie Field and Matty Dale.
A 2000 plus crowd infront of the Sky cameras, were left stunned early on as Rovers made an error on the first set, after receiving the ball from the kick off, Toulouse caught us short on cover wide out and opened the scoring.
Things settled not long after as Rovers began to find their feet in the game, but Mr Turley seemed intent on trying to stamp his authority on proceedings with a succession of pedantic penalties for a number of different offences, stopping any game flow and certainly frustrating the home crowd.
Zak Hardaker managed to latch on to a delayed pass from Jesse Joe Parker and streaked away to avoid the cover, with Briggs adding the extras and Ian Hardman then going over almost un-oppossed by the posts, home fans were wondering if another 'points fest' was on the cards.
Turning around 18-10 at the break, with the rain closing in, after further tries from Zak Hardaker and Ian Hardman 24-10 early in the second half looked to be a comfortable enough position to go on and win the game, but poor ball control in vital areas of the field and the consistent whistle blowing of the T.V. debutant in the middle saw frustration and mistakes creep into the Rovers game in the second half. - That said, apart from a consistently poor 10 metres at the play the ball, T.V. coverage seemed to suggest that the majority of decisions were in fact correct.
The fine 9 game winning run ended here tonight with a Toulouse try and conversion 3 minutes from time to break Rovers hearts, but with a few days break before our next Championship fixture, after a 'poor day at office' tonight and hopefully normal service will be reusumed shortly.
Heads up, chests out, disappointed today, but with the return fixture not far away the chance to even things up will I'm sure will have the boys chomping at the bit !
