National Three South West

Cornish All Blacks 18

Old Redcliffians 18

THE Cornish All Blacks put up a strong and spirited fight against Old Redcliffians on Saturday, and despite dominating the majority of the game, a penalty try for the visitors in the dying minutes of the game allowed them to snatch an 18-18 draw in National League Three South West.

The Cornish All Blacks did play a great game of rugby and it wasn’t a walk in the park for the visitors against a side who went into the game, in second-place and in great form.

The home side started quickly and were awarded a penalty seconds into the game, but Fraser Honey’s kick went wide.

A scrum near the All Blacks’ try line set Old Redcliffians up for an unconverted try in the 11th minute, scored by James Clements.

The All Blacks increased the pace and put the visitors on the back foot. A good run by Martin Kneebone, dodging a couple of Old Redcliffians on the way, led to an unconverted try for the All Blacks just eight minutes later.

The visitors were a well-drilled side and split the Launceston pack apart, but the home side tackled very well and put in some big hits.

A penalty gave the visitors an advantage and Harvey Skelton’s kick put them in the lead.

Both sides conceded a number of penalties throughout the first half, but it was the Cornish All Blacks who went in front at the half-time whistle, after Honey offloaded to Danz Faamatuainu who touched down for his try for the club.

This time Honey converted the try to give them a four point cushion at the break.

The second-half started off well for the All Blacks. They continued to gain momentum and extended their lead when Honey took the gamble with a penalty from quite a way out.

The All Blacks knew Old Redcliffians are a good outfit and needed to keep it up. A couple of mistakes by the visitors led to more penalties, one slotted through the posts by Honey.

The All Blacks were now 10 points in the lead and would have been confident of making it three consecutive home victories.

The Bristol-based outfit had a couple of opportunities to score, but Launceston let them in when they didn’t clear their lines and gave away a penalty in front of the posts. Ashley Groves took the kick and reduced the deficit to 18-11.

The visitors were now a converted try away from equalising. With six minutes left, play moved dangerously close to the All Blacks’ try line. The home side were defending well, but gave away a couple of costly penalties, one which saw flanker Gareth Williams sent to the sin-bin for the rest of the contest.

With one man down, it was a fight to the finish. After more penalties were conceded in injury-time, referee Mason Davies awarded a penalty try to Old Redcliffians.

Groves made the conversion to seal the draw and earn his side two points.

Player/coach, Ryan Westren, was delighted with the team performance but admitted that they need to learn how to close out matches when they get into winning positions.

He said: "If you would have asked us before the game whether we would have taken two points against them we would have, but it transpired that we could have come away with four or five points. It’s just frustrating. We controlled the game for 75 minutes, then the momentum swayed and it’s hard to come back from that.

"We’re a team in transition. We will learn from these mistakes hopefully. We’ve moved on heaps and bounds in eight games. If we keep going like that we should be okay. Everybody’s working as hard as they can and it’s starting to show. I just wish we could transfer it to the away games. We nearly got everything right today but we just didn’t finish it off."

Cornish All Blacks

Kneebone, Dawe, Westren, Faamatuainu, Morris, Honey, Sandercock, Parsons, Bulut, Hurdwell, Merritt, Hiscock, Williams, Duke L, Duke J.

Replacements: Hocking, Crabb, Snell.

Tries: Kneebone (19), Faamatuainu (34)

Conv: Honey (35)

Pen: Honey (48) (56)

Old Redcliffians

Owen, Clements, Caven, Mayes, Bird, Skelton, Groves, Harvey, McGrath, Joseph, Foss, Ival, Fox, Templer, Goodfield.

Replacements: Parsons, Purlell, Harris.

Tries: Clements (11)

Penalty try: 82

Conv: Groves (82)

Pen: Skelton (26), Groves (68)

Half-time: 12-8

Referee: Mason Davies

Man of the match: Fraser Honey

Attendance: 561

Sin bin: Gareth Williams (CABs)