Saturday 23 November 2013

Penarth 17 – Pontyclun 16

To look at the final score you would be forgiven for believing this to have been an 80 minute cliff-hanger of a match. This is only true for the final minutes. Up until then it had been difficult to work out how a dominant Penarth could not be comfortably secure of victory.

It didn’t help the home side to ship what was effectively a 14 point deficit in the opening minutes. Seven of these points were actually conceded when Pontyclun number 7 Rose saw a gap, opted for a quick tap penalty, darted through and released his support for a touch down under the posts.

Seeking instant redress James Docherty looked up at a miss-aligned defence, skipped through and spread the ball. Sadly, with wing James Crothers facing only fresh air the final pass flew 2 meters in front of him. So a 7 point reply went begging.

This then became a bit of a frustrating pattern for the home side. They quickly established that despite remaining a fluent attacking threat the visitor’s defensive line up was suspect. This led to exciting home breaks again by Docherty; by mazy running from both centres, James Thatcher and Mike Gubb. James Candy burst through from full back and wings Crothers and Ben Donovan also made inroads. The home back line was rampant.

At the same time the pack was doing its job and more; noticeably shoving Pontyclun off their own ball, by smart little breakaways with a slip pass back inside from Mike Clare to scrum half Rhys Morgan and particularly a couple of hugely enjoyed charges from Jon Boland scattering opponents in his wake.

The frustration was that in all this period of carving great swathes through the opposition the only concrete benefit was a single penalty conversion. Time and again try scoring was denied by a dropped final pass, a slight knock on, poor off load or similar error.

As so often it is the side under the cosh that scores. So it was that Pontyclun said thanks for a penalty and Penarth went in at half time 3 – 10 in arrears.

But they stuck to the task and positive signs were still there, with a stream of line out possession supplied by Boland and set piece domination. Chris Mortimer for Rhys Morgan and Geraint Blake for Matt Sutton were added to the mix and Penarth reverted to the simple stuff.

Thatcher collected loose ball and elusively made all the yards needed for a line out deep into Pontyclun territory. Boland duly secured possession for the aggressive maul. This wasn’t immediately successful so the dose was administered once more with close quarters master Clare claiming the resulting drop down.

With the scores now level a home win looked well on the cards. Fate then took a bizarre twist with fly half Docherty yellow carded for hands in the ruck! Pontyclun benefited from the converted penalty then yet another leaving the still dominant Penarth anxiously six points adrift with only ten minutes remaining.

It looked as if the old bitter lesson of victory going to the side which took points on the few occasions they were available would come true again and the home supporters began the nibbling of finger nails in real earnest.

To their delight and relief in equal measure Penarth got back to what they do immaculately. One more time it went to Boland in the line out, smuggled to the safety of the maul with Joe Page capping another vigorous performance by dropping over the line. The conversion was by no means certain but Docherty remained cool as ever to add the two points for the narrowest of victories.

Still things for Penarth to work on but a performance of tenacity and determination against a very good side who were clearly second best on the day.

On Saturday 7th December Penarth are away at Aberdare.

The next home fixture is Saturday 28th December against league leaders Cardiff Quins.

Penarth:- James Candy; Ben Donovan; James Thatcher; Mike Gubb; James Crothers; Rhys Morgan (Chris Mortimer); Gary Power (capt.); Joe Page; Sean O’Sullivan; Stuart Clarke; Jon Boland; Scott Mackie; Mike Clare; Matt Sutton (Geraint Blake).