NLCRFC 41 – SPRINGFIELD RIFLES RFC 10
10 OCTOBER 2009
Report by A John Aitken
New London County’s annual charity fundraiser, this year in support of Special Olympics and this season’s first home game at Clark Lane Middle School, saw the men in grey and black facing a very physically committed Springfield side. New London, still smarting after a narrow defeat away to Seacoast in their previous fixture tore, into the opposition from the off. Three minutes into proceedings the adventurously coiffured Springfield outside centre was shown the error of his ways as he dallied in midfield when he was cut in half by a characteristically bone-crunching tackle by Ken Laverty, the raging bull seemingly fired up by a green barnet rather than a red rag. The ensuing melee resulted in the visitors going off their feet at the ruck and Tim Johnson stepped up to coolly slot home the penalty goal and put the home side 3 nil up. Actually the opening minutes of this match would display its defining features: the calm control of Johnson at 10, wince inducing tackling, particularly from Dickinson and Laverty, ferocious New London rucking and Springfield forced into a series of infringements when they were not exploring the definition of offside.
With only 8 minutes gone fine driving play from the home forwards led to a strong charge from loose head prop Will Hergott who smashed his way into the 22 before further support led to Greg Smith burrowing his way over for New London’s opening score about 5 metres to the right of the uprights. The conversion was missed but the action was soon back in frenetic fashion and one minute after New London’s opener Springfield pulled back a penalty of their own after a failure to get back 10 from an initial whistle saw NLC marched back an extra ten yards.
The home side came back strongly and were unfortunate not to cap a lovely counter-attack with a try after Brian Taylor ran the ball back from a loose kick and slick handling saw the three quarter line showing their class. Powerful and clever scrummaging from the visitors resulted in the reset set piece being awarded to the Rifles but a flurry of fisticuffs gave a clue to the mounting pressure being felt by the visiting side. Chris Lowe then missed out after being pinged for a double movement but little matter as continued New London pressure gave their influential fly half the opportunity to canter over and then knock over the extras to put NLC 15 – 3 up. As tempers frayed Gregg Smith was victim of some vigorous footwork which left him with a bloodied ear but somehow the Rifles were awarded the penalty. Justice was done, however, as Springfield failed to make touch and Taylor fielded the ball before releasing Dickinson who scythed his way across the pitch showing tremendous pace and exhilarating footwork to unlock the defence and blaze his way into the 22, a finely weighted pass found Lowe at inside centre who burst over for a good score, converted by Johnson.
The match almost boiled over as a flurry of punches from Springfield’s number 8 led to retaliation and yellow cards for both Tim Johnson and the green and yellow’s back rower with the firm suspicion on the touch line that New London’s fly half had been targeted. Doug Parulis stepped into the fly half role and when Springfield botched their penalty he was able to clear to touch before stepping back into the line out to win spoil Rifles ball. The referee was forced to go to his pocket again, this time brandishing a red card to a Rifles front row player who had been blatantly stamping on Scott, fortunately the scrumhalf’s oil slick of a hairstyle meant the worst of the blows skidded off though his back resembled a map of the London Underground! A green turnover resulted in great team play releasing the rapier of NLC’s fullback, Dickinson. He tore the visiting defence apart before a nicely judged pass found Lowe drawing his man before unloading to the twinkle toed Louis Zubek who danced in for New London’s fourth try with about 38 minutes gone.
Half time may have given the teams a breather but the second half started as though there had been no let up. New London, then had to show strong willed defence with Dickinson and Smith combining to smash back the gargantuan Rifles lock as he charged towards the line and was brought to a shuddering halt about 2 metres out. With the pressure relieved NLC’s inspirational skipper was forced to leave the pitch with a nasty injury to the side of his face and ‘jack in the box’ back rower Nate Stewart joined the fray with about 55 minutes gone. Stewart pulled off his now familiar trick of scoring within about 10 minutes of getting onto the pitch after some fine work from Parulis intercepting Rifles ball and feeding out to Johnson before Stewart showed good pace in support to fly over.
Further substitutions followed for NLC and after some strong scrummaging on the part of the visitors Springfield managed to pull back a consolation score after taking advantage of confusion in the home defence. Dickinson finally got his just rewards getting on the end of a scoring pass from a ruck and bursting over from 10 yards with about 3 minutes to go.
At the whistle NLC, showed their class and respect to the opposition with a hearty three cheers and then turned to applaud the crowd, their appreciation being deservedly reciprocated after a fine display of disciplined but exciting rugby. Having raised over $950 for their chosen charity, New London RFC are back to winning ways and look determined to push all the way into November.
NLCRFC Team Sheet
15. R D Dickinson
14. E Issler (70 Wittpenn)
13. L Zubek
12. C Lowe
11. B (74 Millard)
10. T Johnson
9. L Scott
8. D Parulis
7. G Smith (Capt) (55 Stewart)
6. K Laverty
5. M Keltner
4. C Key
3. M Bailey
2. E Knepper (74 Doherty)
1. W Hergott (64 Aitken)
Replacements
Doherty R
J Wittpenn
P Mara
J Millard
N Stewart
A J Aitken