Just fell short

Unfortunately we went into this game with a bare 15 having been let down by a couple of players, though the 15 we had were committed throughout and did not give up almost snatching the match in the last 5 minutes, against a team that had beaten us by 29 clear points earlier in the season. In the first half playing against a strange swirling wind we managed to get 2 early penalties having missed one that swung wildly in the wind.
As a side we dominated the physical Gowerton side and disrupted their game plan from the start, they were continually put on the back foot , and when we took quick penalties were deliberately bought down after a couple of meters, this led to a warning next offence it is a yellow card, and yet again for the second week running the ref did not deliver, when with 10 minutes to go an even more obvious tackle from offside when the quick tap had been taken did not result in the sanction threatened. Even more important was the infringement just after half time when our hooker was trapped at the bottom of a ruck 5 minutes out unable to move at all, was sin binned when the ref said yes I know you cant move but your hands are on the ball, he could not put them anywhere else, injustice felt this was followed up by a further injustice when being down to 7 in the scrum, Gowerton should have dropped their 8 out and also play with 7, despite being told that this was the rule the ref ignored this point ( for your ref law 20.1e) again the second time in 2 weeks this has been ignored. Even though we were playing passive the presence of the 8 at the back who is a very good player gave them the advantage and he was driven over and just about stretching out to dab the ball down even though it did appear the ball came away from the hand.
We had continual chances as the game moved on 2 kickable penalties went wayward, with one kick being struck to get accuracy rather than power being help up in the swirling wind to dip under the posts.
The warriors who had been fighting like the cast of Sparta throughout were beginning to tire and as Gowerton bought on subs they got a break when their centre skipped round our backs who were carrying bumps that led them to be slightly off the mark. This bought the score to 12 6, the yellow card not given event happened next and with 5 to go we again attacked and worked an over lap on the left when at the 22m line a pass to hand would have led to a 2 on 1 with only one defender to beat and no one else within 10 m, however the pass went wayward probably due to tiredness of the deliverer.
The game was relentless to the last minute, but this was a moral victory to us, 15 dedicated players, bad luck with the man in the middle, and a very good opposition rattled. One telling comment being that its a pity that the 3rd years are going up as the team is now coming of age, hopefully with a cup semi coming up we can get the results that all players in this team deserve