Managers Comments – Redruth v Weston-Super-Mare
Another good second half performance ensured we came away from this match with a maximum haul of 5 points and results elsewhere in the league did us a slight favour with Barking just edging it against Hertford but dropping a point for the second week running. North Walsham put away Tabard at home and still remain 7 in front of us, so it is still all to play for. Yesterday’s performance was a bit of a stop start affair to say the least with Weston players going down at regular intervals to try and disrupt our patterns. This succeeded quite well in the 1st half as we played rugby on their terms, however a good “chat” at half time resulted in a completely dominant performance in the second half scoring 5 unanswered tries. So that is 20 tries in the last 3 games, 19 out of a possible 20 points in January and, I am reliably informed, that this victory gave us our fourth consecutive double over our opponents throughout January, which is a club record. Next weeks game at Tabard will be a big challenge for us as we do not perform that well there, but if the guys can retain the focus they clearly have then things should go our way.
Last weeks meeting at Penzance went extremely well and our hope now is that a lot of what we discussed comes to fruition. I have no doubts that things will materialise and that both clubs will benefit immensely from the outcome. Dave Whitehead missed out yesterday with a finger injury but should be available this week. Richard Carroll made a succesful return albeit not 100% fit.
Finally this week, I saw the club’s Under 14′s play their cup quarter final against old rivals Truro on Sunday, and what a great game it was. It wasn’t the most skilfull I have ever seen but the passion and pride shown by the Reds was superb. No 8 Tom Simmons is a player to look out for and other top performances came from Ben Noyce (hope that’s the right spelling), Sam Newman, Josh Matavesi, Daniel Dunstan and Richard Keverne. Hopefully this group will go on to win the trophy and thus keep up their record of winning cups at every age level they have played at… well done boys and well done to coaches Nigel Thomas and Phil Olds.
So its off to Hertfordshire again at the weekend and I hope I am able to provide another positive write up next week….
Cheers for now…
David Penberthy