Grey wallop Queen's

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:24

The visiting Grey 1st XV lived up to its reputation of  being one of the top schoolboy rugby sides in the country this season, by walloping Queen’s by 48 points to 17 on the Recreation grounds on Saturday afternoon in a performance that will certainly go down as one of their better against a Queen’s side in recent seasons.

The early stages were characterised by very physical exchanges in the machine room, with a number of players licking their wounds early on, as a result one or two bruising encounters. Grey dictated much of the play, but was well contained by Queen’s in the first 15 minutes.   Despite Grey’s dominance, it was Queen’s who took an early 10 – 0  lead . A very well struck penalty from an acute angle by the Queen’s flyhalf Athi Gxotiwe in the 7th minute, followed by an interception try four minutes later, when centre Linton Terblanche capitalised on some confusion in the Grey midfield and was able to gather the ball and run 60 metres to score a try, gave the home supporters much hope.

A composed Grey side continued dominating the possession and scored their first try in the 15th minute of the game, while Queen’s had to be content with back foot ball from the set phases. The Queen’s defence held until the latter stages of this half, but thereafter  Grey seemed to have far too much space in which to run at will.  The Grey backline gave an impeccable display of pace and skill with both centres, Sikholele Blom and Hayden de Villiers,  crossing the Queen’s tryline before halftime.

During the second half, Grey hardly put a foot wrong and capitalised on an inept Queen’s defence to score four more tries. The Grey halfback combination of Chuma Faas at scrumhalf and Curt Coleman at flyhalf, clinically exploited the holes in the Queen’s defence to give their outside backs plenty of space to score four well worked tries during this half.  

Queen’s only second half points were scored in the 15th minute, when Linton Terblanche  powered his way across the advantage line, ran 20 metres with the ball before offloading to fullback  Leon Makiwane who outstripped his opposition to  score.

For Queen’s, the young loose head prop Allan Dell, had a stormer of a game giving his opposite number a torrid time in the scrums. His general play in the tight loose was also most reassuring.

Left wing S’bura Sithole, playing his 50th match for the 1st XV, also made good use of the little ball that he received.

The two-week holiday break will be in important time in which players are able to rest, recover and  refocus on the second half of their demanding season.

By Mike Boy

Scorers:

For Grey:
Tries: Haydn de Villiers 2, Chuma Faas 2, Sikhokele Blom 3,
Cons: Kurt Coleman 5
Pen: Kurt Coleman

For Queen's:
Tries: Linton Terblanche, Kantu Qxotiwe
Cons: Linton Terblanche 2
Pen: Linton Terblanche