There was much pause for thought before this game, recognised formally by a sombre minute's silence before the start.

The funerals of Gwyn Morgan and Tony Richards, loyal servants both, of Monmouth and Crumlin RFCs respectively, had taken place in the days before the game and young Monmouth Rifleman, Jamie Gunn, had died tragically in Afghanistan in the service of his country.

Crumlin were fired up it seemed by the circumstances but Monmouth took the first fifteen minutes to respond to the stirring play of their opponents and the 18 points they had already amassed through a dropped goal, penalty goal and two tries, one of which they converted.

Players looked lethargic with a few notable exceptions, and defence and support of others seemed foreign words but suddenly after falling for a sucker interception try in mid-field from a suicidal pass, play picked up and fly-half Dace Croudace grubber kicked through and even though Crumlin appeared to have the ball well covered in the dead ball area, Croudace's chasing paid off as he was first to the touch-down and wing David Brace added the conversion.

Monmouth frequented Crumlin's red zone, missing two kickable penalties in the process, showing individual bursts of talent but perhaps not in the joined up way that will bring better results. To whom it may concern it can often be better to use a supporting player than to try and go it alone!

The Coach said it all at half-time. If the home team curt out the frantic and sometimes silly passes, keeping the ball in hand whilst going patiently through the phases, victory could be theirs despite the gifts of the early part of the game.

But players still ran themselves into trouble and were too easily wound up by provocative visitor actions until following a high tackle Dave Brace kicked a further three points to edge Monmouth nearer. And then with 15 minutes to play things started to work as intended and after several phases of play the ball was spun along the line left for left wing (and later replacement scrum-half) Matt King to scamper around the remaining defence to score a much needed try.

Tempers became frayed and both sides had players sent off to cool down but the loss of Crumlin's belligerent No 8 weakened them and Monmouth attacked again and from a series of winning rucks centre Andrew Layne crossed to take Monmouth into a two point lead with only minutes of ordinary time left.

The game should now have been Monmouth's, but Crumlin at the last gasp kicked deep and instead of kicking to touch, a Monmouth player tried to run the ball out of defence only to get caught. In the frantic activities that followed a penalty was conceded which Crumlin converted well for a 20-21 much needed victory. A sad day for many but no time for dwelling on matters as Machen are the team on the radar away next week and Monmouth need to regain the ability to play for the full 80 minutes when they should be a match for almost any team in their league.