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Victory for Spalding Rugby Club over Stewart and Lloyds




Three tries in each half saw Spalding back to their very best in a 38-14 home victory over Stewart and Lloyds on Saturday.

The Elephants had to overcome a tough opening quarter with their Corby visitors dominating territory in the Counties 1 Midlands East (South) clash.

However, Spalding responded with an excellent display of attacking running rugby to secure a superb success.

Spalding ran in three tries in each half of Saturday’s success.
Spalding ran in three tries in each half of Saturday’s success.

It was the stand-out performance of a full weekend of rugby for Centenary Park club after a fortnight of having games postponed due to sodden and frozen pitches.

The second team had been in action at Thorney on Friday night while Colts played 24 hours later against Nottingham Corsairs in an NLD Cup game.

Centenary Park was then packed on Sunday with visiting teams from Market Rasen, Mansfield and Holt for junior games.

Spalding had entered Saturday's match knowing it was a must-win game against a visiting side who were lying above them in the league table.

The opening quarter-of-an-hour saw S&L dominate territory and forced Spalding’s defence to stand up and be counted with their fly half Jay Manson pulling the strings.

The home team's back row of Will Shields, Jack Grundy and Lachlan Summers were putting in some excellent tackles and forcing a number of handling errors and turnovers.

Steadily by playing the ball out wide through the backs, Spalding started to threaten and after a scoreless opening 25 minutes of play left wing Gav Sharman found space and broke away at speed.

With a covering tackle coming in, a pass to outside centre Jack Patrick saw the first try put onto the scoreboard.

Within a couple of minutes, scrum half Jim Wraith - who had an outstanding game - made a solo break and was stopped just short of the try line.

S&L reacted with some tough tackling and the referee had to call both captains together to lower the temperature.

But the Spalding forwards were leading the charge with Summers making forceful carries with props Sam Cowell and Luke Turner in support as flanker Shields finished off with a try near the posts and Conall Mason converted.

Spalding were on a high, running the ball with purpose in open space and it was no surprise just before half-time that Mason burst through S&L's stretched defence to score under the posts and, with a simple conversion, the hosts had a lead of 19 points.

Tom Parker replaced Cowell in the front row but it was the visitors who scored first with a converted try through their inside centre Kieran Manson to get them back into the game.

The battle in the forwards was competitive with both scrums holding their own while, at the lineouts, George Douglas was supreme and Shields at the front stole several of S&L's lineout balls and hooker Tom Rollinson’s throwing in was perfect on the day.

Spalding then lost full-back Ryan Firth who sustained a shoulder injury following a poor tackle and he was replaced by Sam Christie.

With a quarter-of-an-hour left, Spalding took a decisive lead.

Summer made a typical thrusting break through the middle to set up a good ruck ball on S&L's 22.

Scrum half Wraith was quickly there and, noting a lack of any cover defence by the visitors, surged under the posts and, with another simple conversion, the try bonus point had been secured.

This was followed up by a stunning counter attack.

Sharman took a good catch and offloaded to Patrick just inside Spalding’s half and he sliced through a gap in the visitors defence and sped down the left wing, outpacing all the cover defence to score by the corner flag.

With time nearly up, Spalding launched one final attack with the ball fed across the backs by fly half Willis Ingleby.

It landed in right wing Ben Shields' hands and from 20 yards out his speed and agility took him past the first couple of tackles and, as the final defence came in, Shields just managed to ground the ball on the try line to seal a brilliant performance by Spalding.

They host Biggleswade at Centenary Park on Saturday.

Spalding: Sam Cowell, Tom Rollinson, Luke Turner, George Douglas, Harry Brett, Will Shields, Jack Grundy, Lachlan Summers, Jim Wraith, Willis Ingleby, Ben Shields, Conall Mason, Jack Patrick, Gav Sharman, Ryan Firth. Subs: Tom Parker, Sam Christie, Taylor Crowson.



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