Senior 1st XV Match Report, Cheltenham North, County Cup
Saturday 30th August 2008
Cheltenham North 43 Old Centralians 40
Old Cents made the short journey to Chelt North without six senior players and expected a torrid time from a Chelt North side who have played a few matches previous to this match.
Old Cents had only one trial match before this game and were short of match practice and the last time the sides met three years ago, North won by over 30 points.
In deed the match started badly for the visitors when they went 14 points down in the first 10 mins and the omens did not look good, the memories of that last match were on the supporter minds.
However to their credit Old Cents did not fold like on many times before.
Old cents came back strongly and took the match to the North with the home side having to defend the visitors attacks to get back into the match.
Old cents first score was when young winger Lewis May scored a fine try in the corner.Craig Anderson brought Old Cents right into match when he struck two penalties following conserted pressure on the Norths defence and this brought the score to 14-11 to the North.
Chelt North scored a further converted try when they opened up the Old Cents defence with a well worked move.Following this, straight away new boy Craig Hopson should have been awarded a penalty try when he was impeded by a north player in the race for a touch down and how the ref did not award the try is beyond me and most of the Old cents supporters.
However to their credit Old Cents did not react to this decision and kept their discipline. A few minutes later Craig kicked a further penalty to reduce the score to 21-13 and later another to make the score just before half time 21-16.
On the stroke of half time Old Cents got the try their play deserved when Rob Pinkney scored a try from a lineout close the the Norths line and Criags conversion hit the post from a difficult angle.
Half Time : Cheltenham North 21 Old Centralians 21
Old Cents were the stronger side going in at half time and they kept the momentum going at the start of the second half when the they took the lead for the first and only time in the match.
Craig converted two penalties in a short space of time to make the score 21-27 to old Cents.
North came back into match and converted a penalty plus 3 tries,two converted, as they hit a purple patch midway throug the second half.
Craig kept Old cents in touch as they fought back every time the home side scored with two penalties.
Going into the final stages North led 43-33 and more or less straight after Norths final try Old cents again showed the character when capt. for the day Michael Mumford scored under the posts following a clever chip over the Norths defence.Craig converted the try to bring the score to 43-40 to the home side and Old Cents were not finished as they went close on two occasions in the dying minutes but the North held out for a win.
The game was a very entertaining match played by two sided who wanted to play open rugby and all the best to the North for the coming season.
Old Cents can be very proud of this display as not many people thought they would come close in this encounter especially with so many senior players missing and a lot of youngsters playing in their places.
Liam Blackmore at just 17 had another fine game following the trial against Old Boys.Sam Preece,also 18, making his senior debut at first team level was another to have a fine game in the front row.
The Hopson brothers also did no wrong on their debuts for the club along with Dale Harper in the second row making his first debut.
However I pick Craig Anderson as the Old Cents man of the match for a more mature performence from him at outside half.He controled the match for Old Cents with a fine kicking display both form hand and place kicking.
The whole team can be proud of the way they played with nobody having a bad game.The team played for each other and the discipline was very good with hardly a wrong word said the referee.
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