Sat 11 Dec 2021, 14:00
On a grey Saturday afternoon, the Cambridge crowd gathered more in hope than expectation. We all knew how good the team was, but, despite some good wins, we had not really seen them deliver. Facing the league leaders, would they lift their game or crumble.
Cambridge kicked off and Rosslyn Park claimed the ball, and we were soon defending in our twenty-two. They were able to score first with a slick backs' move executed at pace to force a missed tackle, which gave them all the gap they needed.
Cambridge got their hands on the ball, we tried to drive but were stopped, but recycled Will Wand found a great running line and scored his first try. Marc Koteczky converted and we were level.
We were on the attack again and our forwards exerted pressure, earning a sequence of penalties, with the advantage coming Matt Hema chipped, regathered and dotted down This time the conversion went wide, but we were 12-7 up after 20 minutes.
The rest of the half was mainly firm Cambridge defence against the irresistible tide of the Park attack. We almost held them out, but they grabbed a second score just before half-time, so we went in 12-14 down, but it was still anyone's match.
From the restart we won a penalty straight in front of the posts, which saw Park seeing yellow. We opted to kick, Marc splitting the posts to regain the lead 15-14. Although down to 14, Park were almost immediately on the attack, coming back with their third try, which went unconverted. However, anything they could do, we could do better. After a kicking exchange, Joe Green made a break, Will Wand ran n support and his arcing lien took him to a second try. Marc's conversion gave us a three point lead, 22-19.
Park had the best of the next ten minutes, and regained the lead with a fourth try. They were on the attack again when Joey Patrick intercepted a pass and raced to the line. So with twenty minutes to o we were back in front, by three points, 27-24
Five minutes later, Park had won a penalty, and looked to level with a straight forward kick, but their kicker pulled it across the posts.
Cambridge were then forced to absorb more Park pressure. We forced a loose ball, Mat Hema kicked through, and Kieran Frost was charging after it, and Park were forced to pull him down off the ball, leading to a second yellow. The kick set up a Cambridge line out and a drive to the line. This too was pulled down, and the referee went under the pots for a penalty try, giving us a ten point lead 34-24, with time nearly up.
There was still time for Park to score a final try from a catch and drive, but they scoffed the conversion.
Will Wand was the man of the match, but it was a complete performance from 1 to 15. We were in Rosslyn Park's face the whole game, they got flustered and made mistakes, which we were able to exploit. When we had the ball we had attacking options through both forwards and backs. And most importantly, we played for 80 minutes, with 15 men for the entire game.
Onwards to Bishop's Stortford.
Final Score
Cambridge 39 - 34 Rosslyn Park.
Scorers
Tries: Hema, Wand(2), Patrick, Penalty
Coversions: Koteczky (2)
Penalty: Koteczky
