News

08 October 2017 / Team News

Iuean shows the steelmen his mettle!

Whiteheads 26-19 Cae

Firstly, it’s appropriate here to say a fond farewell to Nyle and Cian who have both left the club after joining back at the very beginning, in the days when we played with tags, leggings and tears when it was cold. They have been great ambassadors for the club and are both talented players, good luck lads, you will be missed greatly but I’m sure that it will be onwards and upwards for you on life’s journey!

As we’d never played the steelmen previously I’m ashamed to say that I’d never heard of this club before (it is fair to say that none in attendance today will ever forget them now). They are a club steeped in rugby history, both Bobby Windsor and Charlie Faulkner played for them and they had two unbeaten seasons in 1953 and 1966.

Today was a day of firsts: first visit to Whiteheads, first yellow card, first time I’d had to park in a river and the first time parents got sunburnt in October.

Some of the boys asked me if rugby officials ever smoke? I replied that of course not, these people were fitness fanatics, though I understood that in the past some might have occasionally liked to chew bacca...

First half: Whiteheads 12-12

The first half began in brilliant sunshine, we knew that we were up against an unbeaten side and there was a frisson of anticipation amongst excited parents on the sidelines.

The start was very even, with both teams going hell for leather and the first try could have gone either way. As it was the first try went to the home team after Little Ry was harshly judged to have not released his man after making a stunning tackle and turnover, from the resulting penalty they scored. Little Ry was to play quite a prominent role in this game...

Cae heads dropped a bit now and a second try followed quickly afterwards.

The home team were very unlucky with injuries, indeed after most scrums or rucks they would have a player down requiring prolonged treatment both in this half and the second, which couldn’t be helped, but meant that the game struggled to get going and time went on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on.......

Ieuan was showing up really well around the pitch, bravely picking the ball up at ruck time and making some strong runs.

Despite the fragmented nature of the game, we started to take over and a great run from Charlie led to him feeding Sawyer who went over in the corner. Sawyer is one of our unsung forward heroes, spending most of his time securing the ball for others, so it was good to see him getting a a bit of the limelight. Not long afterwards Little Ry (told you he figured a lot in this game) beat half the Whitehead team with an arcing run to score before Tom converted to send us into half time level.

Second half: Whiteheads 26-19 Cae

This second half was quite simply like nothing we’ve ever seen before....the turning point was a Whitehead break down the left wing, their big winger saw little Ry in front of him and wisely chose to avoid a tackle situation and kicked the ball over his head and chased his kick. Little Ry, disadvantaged by having to turn, found himself playing catch up as the two battled for the ball. There was a coming together and the ball went dead, but wait... the ref is running under the posts to give a penalty try! And if that isn’t bad enough Little Ry has been sent to the bin for ten minutes as a yellow card is flashed...

With us reduced to 14 men and naively forgetting to cover the full back position, we conceded again moments later as another kick over the top led to their speedster touching down to stretch the lead and effectively kill the game off...or at least that would have been the case if they weren’t playing these little green ones who have hearts the size of Lake Superior and the determination of a Caerphilly resident trying to drive to Cardiff over Caerphilly mountain in morning rush hour with a meeting planned before 11am....

We held out for the rest of the sin bin and then it was the return of the Jedi as little Ry came back on, he of course scored straight away with a typical sidestepping burst of genius..

Ten minutes left and we attacked and attacked but the home team players kept getting injured, it was well into double figures by the end and some of these injuries looked quite nasty, it’s hoped that everyone is recovered now. Each injury would lead to a stop of several minutes and the beleaguered ref would forget what the situation had been before the injury leading to some strange restarts and some helpful advice from both sets of parents.

By the end we were playing with non contested scrums as the home team had lost so many forwards, hurt at scrum time, it was almost a relief at the end when the home side, oddly for this age group, chose to kick out of play a penalty near our line rather than attempt to score and on that note the strangest game in our five year history came to a close. Who knows what Hans Solo and his co pilot would have made of such a game?

Man of the Match

Was a well earned reward for Iuean, one of our newcomers this season, who produced a magnificent battling effort against a very good team, his bravery really shone through and he can be well pleased with this excellent performance. When asked what he put his great performance down to, he replied “I like to think I bring a new hope to the team”. Wise words indeed... onwards and upwards for the brilliant little green army...

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