First XV V. Old Crescent
AIL 2A Round 3
vs Old Crescent
Stradbrook
This Division is not going to be straight forward this season.
That is the consensus of all the teams in Div. 2A, as only one team remains unbeaten after round 3.
It was a case of ‘Spot the Leinster coach’, as Head Coach, Leo Cullen was the guest speaker at our sell out lunch.
Leo brought along some of the other Leinster coaches to hear him speak about his many memories of his time playing in Stradbrook.
Old Crescent are celebrating their 75th anniversary this year and it was great to see Fr. Thomas (Todd) Morrissey at the lunch.
Fr. Morrissey played in Crescent’s first ever AIL match.
A heavy shower gave way to blue skies just as the teams ran out.
We kicked off towards Lucey Park with a serious wind behind our backs.
In what appeared to be a mirror image of our previous home game against Ballymena, we got off to a fast start.
On 8 minutes, full back Brian ‘Cokes’ Colclough ran a brilliant line to score.
Peter ‘Kicker’ Quirke added the extras.
7 : 0
From the Crescent kick off, Cokes kicked a 50/22 and we attacked again.
Decent defence by Crescent led to a turn over and they kicked for touch at half way.
From the line out, we retained possession, passed to Mark ‘Eddie’ Edwards, who spread the ball along the back line.
A loop pass back to Eddie saw him go in for our second Try of the afternoon.
20’
14 : 0
Two minutes later, we witnessed the Try of the afternoon.
Another great take in the line out, by Roy Whelan and it looked like we were going to set up a maul.
Dave McCarthy whipped the ball out of the forwards hands and took off up the pitch.
When tackled, Edwards was there to take the ball.
He passed to Kicker Quirke, who threw a ‘skip’ pass to Mattie Dwan on the wing.
Mattie ducked inside the Crescent winger and threw a two handed, blind overhead pass.
Cokes was on hand to catch the ball and he went in to score.
Kicker added the extra two points.
22’
21 : 0
On 28 minutes, we won a scrum against the feed.
Eddie passed the ball to Kicker Quirke.
In a Try reminiscent of his score against Belfast Harlequins in the play off semi final last season, Kicker dummied not once, but twice to score under the posts.
He then converted his own Try.
I was thinking of changing Quirkies name from ‘Kicker’ to ‘Dummy’ but it didn’t seem right…
28 : 0
Crescent conceded a penalty on their 22 for not rolling away.
Kicker split the posts with the kick and we headed into the break with a 31 point advantage.
H/T
31 : 0
Crescent made some changes at half time and those changes paid dividends.
They got their line out in order and scored a converted Try on 50 minutes.
31 : 7
The ever stronger wind played havoc with our kicks and passing and we struggled to get any momentum in the second half.
Some good forward play by Crescent saw them go in again to score on 58 minutes.
A difficult conversion attempt just missed.
31 : 12
On 68 minutes, Crescent went in again out wide for their third Try of the afternoon.
A good kick into a cross wind sailed over.
31 : 19
Coach Blaney sent on some replacements and some instructions with 10 minutes to go.
As Crescent pushed for a Try bonus, we held firm as they drove towards our line time and time again.
F/T
31 : 19
Thanks to Fergus McGrath for the Report!
MOTM - Brian Colclough
Next two matches are Away:
October 29th - Queens
November 5th - MU Barnhall