Today was our first match of the season. The debut of our coach, and my debut of my rugby in New Zealand.
It could have gone better. First off, our coach was late b/c he was getting tires put on his car and took longer than estimated. The guys ended up getting to the pitch pretty late. We only had about a 10 minute loose warm-up then had to go. I was set in at first five, and I played there the entire match. We did well, but penalties killed us the entire match. The thing that kept us in the match was our defense. At half time the score was 3-0 us.
Our forwards didn't have it together. It's not their fault really. I don't think they've practiced one line-out together during the week. On top of that, we are desperate for locks. Our coach, who is a fullback, had to put on the jersey and play lock. Our pack got pushed around in the scrums losing most of them. I can count on one hand how many line-outs we won the entire match. It was pretty much just one big defensive game the entire time. The end result is 8-3 Avalon. Their try was a lucky one, beginning with a forward pass by them, then the ball went loose and was kicked on the ground about 30 meters to the try zone with them falling on it.
On a personal note, the coaches said that I played well. It's not like I had much of the ball to use, since we never got a set piece off, but I did make a couple line breaks which turned out nice. On one I broke the line and dumped off to my inside hitting the gap while I was going to the ground and we gained alot of ground on that play. My defense was solid and my kicking proved that I still need more work.
All in all I was happy with our play. We set the benchmark and we will get better the more we play with each other. I'm exhausted and was thrashed all game by their huge inside center, but I still took with ass down.
Well, party at the club house and 6 so I have to run. Cheers everyone
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3 comments:
Man, that does not sound like the type of dis-organization a senior 2nd team should have? Your coach 10 minutes late, AND he threw on a jersey? WOW! You must of been like, "WTF?" I am VERY shocked to hear of these turn of events. Kudos to you James for keeping it positive! That attitude will benefit you. So that inside center was giving you the business eh? HAHA! How big was he? Pics from the match on Petone's website?
Well there should be some pictures, but not from our game. I think the photographer got there late so he only got pictures of the Senior 1's and the Prem's. I was really proud of the fact that in the last 5 minutes I made this awesome text book tackle. Their 8 man came running out of a ruck and I hit him square in his gut and stopped him cold, then scooped his legs and drove him into the ground- all within our own 5 meters. Everyone cheered for it. It was great.
Yeah, also about our numbers. The crappy thing is that the younger age grade teams ended up being short on players, so they grabbed a few of our senior 2's to go play for the U-21's. One of our locks and inside centers. Locks seems to be a rare commodity in the club. By the way, how did UL do this weekend?
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