Henley U14’s 5 - 12 Newbury U14 Stags
October 26, 2009
“Oxfordshire U14 Champions Henley succumb to dominant Newbury U14’s”
Newbury U14 Stags opened their 15 a side season with a trip to Oxfordshire Champions Henley on Sunday.
Newbury fielding a strong squad seemed to forget to put their clocks back and found themselves behind after 5 minutes with an opening score from Henley which put the Blues on the back foot.
From the restart Newbury began to wake up and after a lacklustre start managed to come back into the game with some strong attacking play.
Henley competed very well and Newbury’s big pack struggled to control the game, as they should have allowing Henley to take ball from them at the breakdown. However Newbury began to win ball and counter Henley and with excellent distribution along the back line Newbury threatened the Henley line on numerous occasions only to be foiled by a tackle or a dropped pass.
Newbury stuck to their task and began to dominate some of the close in exchanges Herrod-Taylor, Price-Richard and Bates breaking the gain line but unable to finish.
Henley were always ready to counter and with their strong centre always looked dangerous but the combination of Bates and Price-Richards at centre snuffed out the danger and allowed Newbury to keep coming back. No quarter given in this game and with more pressure Newbury broke from a ruck and the outstanding Greenshields drove in to score under the posts with Bates converting.
5 – 7 Newbury in front and half time beckoning.
At the break 5 – 7 Newbury.
Coaches View
‘Typical Newbury start….but once we got going things started we looked good. Back line worked well but the forwards just need to win more ball at the breakdown, we got there well and looked strong only to let Henley step over and steal….more work needed on the training ground. We were up at half time and were defending and counter attacking well considering the amount of ball we turned over”.
Injuries at half time meant some changes, Collington and Rees who’d worked tirelessly sustained knocks so could play no further part so a reshuffled pack to the second half. A debut for Andy Hardy who replaced the confident first half performance of Matt Nicholls.
This time Newbury, against a stiff breeze, could have easily crumbled but again what little ball they won allowed the backline to attack and take the game to Henley who thought they may be in with a chance.
End to end rugby with each back line gaining advantage only to be foiled. Herrod-Taylor, Price-Richards, Bates, Fane all attacking at pace. A break out by Henley a try in the corner, no, two tackles in one movement by Herod Taylor, saved the try produced a lineout in the corner for Newbury and the counter was on.
A scrum close to the Henley line saw Ollie Hart go close and in the following counter Henley conceded a penalty and with only two minutes remaining the bizarre happened. A penalty to Newbury in front of the posts, 3 points on the board was the call and Price Richards set himself to kick. A gust of wind the ball off the ‘T’ a call of ‘play it’ from the Head Coach and Price-Richards quick thinking allowed him to pick up, run at the bewildered defence beating 4 tackles in a maizey run to score under the posts.
5 -12 Newbury take the spoils in a well contested, good natured game.
Coaches View
“Overall we did well and winning is always good. The whole squad contributed today and although there were some good individual performances it’s the whole squad who made the victory possible so big credit to all the guys for sticking at the game and not giving any quarter. Henley were well drilled and competitive.
Biggest lesson from today was we need to have more self belief…oh and that we don’t have 10 minutes to wake up when we start the match!!!
Really pleased for the boys well done”
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