Thanks to Nolan for passing on this report from Ventnor RFC. Ed
Alresford 1st XV 19-34 Ventnor 1st XV
With little to no warm up, Ventnor took a little time to wake, but then started playing some excellent rugby in conditions that saw a lot of knock-ons from both teams.
First points of the game from a penalty that was converted by Damien Marriott who would convert three of five kicks. Ventnor went on to score a well worked try with brilliant passing ending with Marriott scoring and converting to take the lead to ten points.
Ventnor show determination
Alresford came back strong and managed to drive down the field and eventually over the line. Having to deal with the loss they suffered last week, Ventnor were determined to not let it happen again and started playing their style of rugby and dictating the game which saw them score a further two tries before the end of this first half.
The first from Wightlink Man of The Match, Paul Berry, with one of his powerful runs breaking tackles to dive over the line. The second from Jake Babington, again after some great handling of the ball from the whole team, Ross Harris found a gap and managed to break through and put a kick through which bounced up for Babington to receive and use his pace to finish. Harris surely would have been able to add one himself had he not been obstructed by the opposition after kicking through for him to chase which saw the player sin-binned.
Ventnor would carry on their form from the first half and got the first points of the half again from Berry after some great work from the forwards making hard tackles and big carries from the likes of Tobias Penner, Captain Todd Riches and Sam Pickard (although he was also given a yellow).
Fighting back
Alresford are not a team to lie down and take defeat and in what seemed like a replay of their first try used their forwards to drive over the line to make it 29-12. Harris and Riches give way to James Rogers and Gareth Davis. With a sight re shuffle and Rogers taking over from Fergus Kenny at 9 who had controlled the game from their releasing players like James Pemberton crashing the ball up but also itching for Alresford backs to receive the ball to let them know he was there.
Sam lines scored the last of the tries with Ventnor pack winning the opposition scrum with great work from the front row Danny Newbury, Tristan Price and A.J.Wells Black Dog winner Lewis Jones (for losing a previous scrum against the head to a 56 year old hooker). The backs were released and the with Lines’ step managed to work his way round the opposition defence and touch down.
Great team effort
Alresford were awarded a penalty try with minutes left of the game when their full-back kicked the ball over the defensive line and ran through to then be brought down off the ball by James Morley which gave the referee no choice after already speaking to the team about penalty counts within their twenty two. All in all it was a great team effort and all 17 players gave their all for the win.
Team: D.Newbury, L.Jones, T.Price, J.Morely, S.Pickard, P.Berry, T.Penner, T.Riches, F.Kenny, D.Marriott, J.Pemberton, J.Babington, E.Blake, R.Harris, S.Lines
Subs: J.Rogers, G.Davies
Wightlink Man of The Match: Paul Berry
A.J.Wells Black Dog Award: Sam Pickard
Alresford 2nd XV 87-12 Ventnor 2nd XV
Ventnor 2, the mighty lions, traveled light this week to watercress capital of the UK, Alresford. With majority of the teams regulars playing in a charity match at Staines rugby club the cupboard looked bare and team captain Jacobus Stemmet had to dig deep to be able to get a team together for this meeting.
Leaving Portsmouth station with just ten players, it looked like it could be a long day.
Alresford kindly agreed to try and even up the teams by only having two more players on the pitch, “gifting” the mighty lions one player and keeping three on the bench.
Scary sub
Ironically the gifted player was still in Halloween dress up with skeleton hands that couldn’t hold on to a egg and cress sandwich on the best of days, but played with a lot of heart and determination.
It was quite clear from the opening exchange that Alresford’s overlap was going to be a big factor and soon after and their winger crashed over in the corner. Alresford built on this by crashing over twice before the Ventnor team finally found their mojo.
Defending around the rucks was not something Alresford was interested in and make shift scrumhalve Joe Pettifer dived over for v2s first score with Adam Pratt adding the conversion.
Flyhalve Calvin Edwards added a second try to bring the score to 20-12 in Alresford favour. Unfortunately this is where V2 luck run out. After this everything went the oppositions way with every bounce going in their favour, every forward pass find a hand and every second pass finding a overlap.
Image: sjbresnahan under CC BY 2.0
