I almost feel as if I have been to this match before

This week Pontypool 'entertained' Llanharan at a sunny but cool Pontypool Park. I think most people thought that we had a fifty-fifty chance of winning and at least that it wouldn't be a trouncing.
As we have seen many times before this season, Pooler set off like a house on fire and quickly raced to an eight point lead before Llanharan realised that the game had started. Pooler created a couple more opportunities but failed to take them and then visitors stronger pack gained the ascendancy. They were stronger at scrum and in ruck and maul and the pressure told and the home side conceded too many turnovers. The inevitable happened and the Pooler lead was quickly overhauled by two Llanharan tries one of which was converted. Pontypool did manage to reply with a Gullis penalty goal to leave the score at 11-12 at half-time. This is quite a familiar situation for Pooler this season and we fervently hoped that we had learned from the narrow victory over Whitland.
Llanharan came out for the second half meaning business and turned pressure into points brushing aside some feeble Pooler tackling to score another two tries to extend their lead to 11-24. This was not meant to happen we wailed. The second half was also noteworthy for a massive brawl involving all thirty players that lead to a red card for each side plus a yellow card for Pooler. This left the game at thirteen men a side for a while as a Llanharan player was already in the sin-bin. The fracas reminded me of the "99" call that the Lions used in Soth Aftrica in 1974 and you had to feel sorry for the referee who was not supported by neutral touch judges. Anyway after this fisticuffs tempers cooled and we got back to the rugby. There was a further flashpoint following a tip tackle by the Llanharan fullback which resulted in a yellow card that many thought should have been red. It was pretty poor stuff but at least Pooler started to apply some pressure. They did not seem to be able to play with any fluency and when they scored a try they had virtually run into a dead-end but Norton somehow managed to break a couple of tackles and race to the line. The try was converted and with the score now 18-24, Pooler sniffed half a chance. Soon after they scored a try from deep within their own twenty two with Dyckhoff showing a fine turn of pace to finish off a super break. We wished that he had managed to cross nearer the posts to make the conversion easier particularly as regular kicker Gullis had been substituted. Mills narrowly missed the conversion to make the score 23-24 with only injury time remaining. Llanharan, however, looked after the ball well and Pooler never really had a scoring opportunity from then on.
Another narrow loss and another losing bonus point. I suppose the question is are Pooler improving? Certain aspects have certainly improved particularly the lineout and at times they do play some attractive rugby but they lack consistency and at times look frail in defence. It was ironic that a certain Mr Huish scored two tries for Llanharan, how we could do with someone like his namesake now.
There is definitely still a long way to go but with a bit of luck we could have won a few more games. Keep working at it Pooler!
Talking of a long way to go, what a disastrous weekend for our East Wales regions with both suffering major defeats at the hands of the Irish. This follows on from the previous weekend when all four Welsh regions lost in Europe. There looks to be a major gulf in class developing at regional level. I was racking my brains to think of one truly world class foreign player playing in Wales and could not think of one so we need to rely on developing our own talent. Starving the clubs of cash lower down the pyramid is not going to help.