SOUTH WALES SCORPIONS 6 LONDON SKOLARS 22

By Ian Golden at Virginia Park

 

In a highly charged game, one of the best seen at Caerphilly this season, London Skolars secured a 22-6 win over South Wales Scorpions in a game that definitely didn’t reflect the scoreline.

 

Scorpions will regret the first ten minutes when the conceded a couple of tries, they’ll also regret their share of dropped balls as the constant rain throughout the day led to 22 scrums, almost a repeat of last week’s game for South Wales in Doncaster.

 

But this week, Scorpions battled harder and it’s credit to the Skolars defence that the score wasn’t closer.

 

Scorpions had an early chance but Ian Newbury pushed into touch as he was near to the try-line.

 

But from the scrum, Skolars worked their way upfield and took the lead after Alex Walker dived over. Jymel Coleman’s kick hit the post.

 

The second try came from kick off as Walker picked up Joe Keyes’ kick to ground. Coleman converted. 10-0 on eight minutes to the Skolars.

 

Both sides competed heavily for the next try but a combination of good defensive work and errors prevented any further score until the 33^rd minute.

 

As the penalty count increased, Scorpions looked for another try. They won a goal-line drop-out on 25 minutes and mishandled as they came near to the line just after the half-hour, but from that particular error, Skolars again had the perfect set and Michael Sykes went in under the sticks and Coleman converted.

 

Scorpions got a try back just before the interval when Jordan Sheridan scored in the corner and Paul Emanuelli converted.

 

The score charged up both sets of players resulting in a far more highly charged second half. It finally blew over 10 minutes into the half and Scorpions’ Connor Farrer was sinbinned for starting a fight. Ryan Chester was held up over the line from the resulting penalty,

 

To waste a bit of time before Farrer came back on, Emanuelli chose to kick a penalty from 40 metres out but it sailed to the left of the posts.

 

Scorpions continued to pound their opponents and did everything but get over the line. Nothing was scored by either side during the time Farrer was in the bin, so with 20 minutes to go, referee Marcus Griffiths, his first professional game in the middle, blew for a lengthy injury stoppage that saw Sheridan limp off, and the teams reassembled for the all-important final “quarter”.

 

Skolars had hardly been out of their own half and it’s credit to their defending that they were still leading by 10 points.

 

The greasy ball continued to cause problems for each side and when Skolars did eventually create an attack, thanks to a decent run from Billy Driver, they knocked on when approaching a scoring position.

 

But Skolars virtually clinched the game with 10 minutes to go as the scored against the run of play, Sam Nash in the corner. Coleman converted to make it 22-6.

 

 

 

SOUTH WALES SCORPIONS

15 Jordan Sheridan

2 Ian Newbury

21 Scott Gregory

22 Christiaan Roets

4 Yannic Parker

30 Jamie Murphy

7 Paul Emanuelli

20 Anthony Symons

9 Connor Farrer

10 Izaak Duffy

23 Barrie Phillips

25 Richard Jones

24 Zak Williams

Subs:

3 Kyle Scrivens

14 Osian Phillips

16 Dafydd Hellard

19 Kristian Baller

 

Tries: Sheridan (36)

Goals: Emanuelli 1/2

 

LONDON SKOLARS

1 Alex Walker

2 Sam Nash

3 Will Lovell

4 Kazeem Fatouri

5 Andy Winfield

18 Jymel Coleman

7 Joe Keyes

8 Mike Greenlagh

9 Charlie Lawrence

10 Dave Williams

15 Eddie Mbaraga

12 Steve Bannister

13 Mike Worrency

Subs:

14 Billy Driver

23 Ben Gray

21 Michael Sykes

11 Ryan Chester

 

Tries: Walker (4, 8), Sykes (33), Nash (70)

Goals: Coleman 3/4

 

Referee: Marcus Griffiths

Half-time: 6-16

Attendance: 170

 

 

 

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