A busy day of junior rugby at Newark RUFC saw the top teams in Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and Derbyshire all meet for the finals of the NLD cup, plate, shield, bowl and vase. After winning all matches in their group outright, the Green and White Tsunami had secured their place convincingly in the final of the Vase for an all-Nottinghamshire showdown against Mansfield.

Corsairs kicked the match off in perfect weather conditions and the first ten minutes set the tone of the match with equal challenges from both sides. In the end, however, after a sustained period of Mansfield pressure, one of their players charged between the posts only to fumble at the critical moment, awarding the scrummage to Corsairs just five metres out. Ollie fed the ball in and an almighty push from a dominant Mansfield pack pushed our lads backwards and stole the ball. This time there was to be no such error and the Mansfield outside centre received a clean pass and cruised over to the left of the posts. The Mansfield outside half slotted a conversion over from a challenging angle to clock up the first seven points of the match to Mansfield.

After the restart, Corsairs once again piled on the pressure in the Mansfield 22 until a lineout was awarded to the opponents. Mansfield cleanly gathered and sent the outside centre to cut through Corsairs’ defence like a knife through butter and run almost the length of the pitch unopposed to score Mansfield’s second try of the match to the right of the posts. Again, the outside half stepped up and added the two points to make it fourteen points unopposed.

Shortly following the next restart, Corsairs were awarded a penalty in the opposition 22 for offside and George first tried to go for the line but ran straight into a wall of forwards, then Ollie managed to wriggle over the line but some great defence by Mansfield stopped him grounding the ball, so play was taken back to the penalty again. Following another offside decision against Mansfield, Ollie managed to throw the ball out to Tom ‘The Beast’ G on the left wing, allowing him to get as far as the five metres before being stopped but Giles supported well on the left shoulder and eventually put the ball down for Corsairs first response.

From a deep restart kick, The Beast gathered and carried the ball back up to the ten-metre line before being brought down and losing the ball in the contact. However, Mansfield then found themselves penalised on a couple of occasions, eating away at their territory all the while. This was to cost them dearly as the ball eventually found Jack, who had popped up on the left wing and stretched with every sinew in his body to touch the ball down onto the try line as he was tackled to bring Corsairs back up to within a score of their opponents. 14-10 at the half time whistle.

Mansfield got the second half underway with a deep kick, which was duly gathered by The Beast and ran back up to the ten metres again before he was brought down. Unfortunately, he lost the ball in the contact and Mansfield found themselves in possession again. The ball quickly reached their secret weapon, that man again, the No.13, who stormed over for the hat trick, adding to Corsairs’ woes. The No.10 stepped up and effortlessly added the conversion.

Corsairs didn’t give up and were still hungry for the win. From the restart, the ball eventually found its way to Hari ‘ASBO’ W in the 5 metre area, but again, good Mansfield defence stopped him from grounding the ball – scrum down, 5 metres out. This time, the Corsairs pack held up long enough for Ollie to gather but one of the Mansfield forwards then found himself on the march to the sin bin for a high tackle, meaning Corsairs were now up against a reduced side. Corsairs took the tap and got the ball to ‘The Hoff’ who attempted to go over but was quickly stopped. However, this time, support came from Ben, who hit like a freight train and ploughed over for the last try of the match between the posts, setting ASBO up to score the first Corsairs’ conversion of the match.

Corsairs failed to take advantage of the sin binning for the remainder of the match and Mansfield held on to finish the game 21-17.
There were some flashes of really good rugby tempered with poor defence and ball handling errors today. Some of the attacking play was great but if the defence doesn’t hold up, the team continually puts itself under pressure. Credit has to go to Mansfield’s pack who dominated the scrums and, of course, their Nos. 10 & 13 who played flawlessly. The game was lost by a tight margin and although their pack dominated the scrum, our pack appeared more mobile. Two of the three Corsairs tries came from forwards and Charlie C had so many open runs at the defence that he started to look more like a three-quarters on some occasions, deservedly earning him his MOTM award for the day for an awesome work rate.

The team were devastated, especially after bonding so well on the previous weekend’s tour in Bath and giving such a good account of themselves at Hungerford despite being exhausted by the weekend’s activities. What Corsairs need to remember is that they still made the final and had to beat three teams to get there. No mean feat. Time to dust down, learn the lessons of the season, keep fit and get ready for the last big get together as Under 15s in the presentation evening. The last year of Junior Rugby beckons in September and the lads should expect great things of themselves in the new season with another exciting tour to look forward to. They have all become good pals and are increasingly playing for each other. From a coaches’ and spectators’ perspective there have been a lot of ‘cliff hangers’ this season but the rugby has almost always been entertaining and Corsairs have never given up the fight, no matter how bad things sometimes appeared. For the spirit in which you play Rugby, well done lads!

Nottingham Corsairs RFC

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