CORNISH All Blacks joint head coach, Ryan Westren, is urging his players to go out and ‘express themselves’ as they look to secure promotion to the South West Premier on Saturday by beating Old Centralians in a play-off at Polson Bridge (3pm).

After an excellent campaign which saw them finish just three points behind champions Okehampton in South West One (West), the All Blacks have a second bite at the cherry when they welcome their Gloucester-based opponents, who were the runners-up in the equivalent East division.

Thankfully for Launceston, due to finishing on 106 points compared to the visitors’ 101, they’ll get to enjoy home comforts.

Such is the closeness between the teams on paper, Old Centralians, like Launceston, won 21 of their 26 league games and conceded just 472 points compared to their hosts’ 520, but scored 26 points less than the All Blacks’ 835, indicating its likely to be a close battle.

Away from home they won nine of their 13 games, losing at champions Newbury Blues, third-placed Banbury and mid-table sides Beaconsfield and Wimborne, but it was at their fortress Saintbridge Sports Centre ground where they were unbeaten bar a 31-12 defeat to Newbury.

Westren and the rest of the coaching team have been working hard, but admits that controlling what they can do is the most important.

“We’re going into the unknown really, which is kind of nice, but obviously we’ve done our homework and we’ve spent the last couple of weeks looking at them and looking into ways of exploiting their weaknesses and seeing where their strengths lie.

“They’ve got a few key players across the board but the main thing for us is that we’ve got to deal with the occasion more than our opponents. The emotion of it will help some players get up for it and some may go into their shells, so we need to make sure we go out there, express ourselves and play the way we can as opposed to going into our shell and getting caught up by the occasion.

“We’ve been through a rebuild for a few years and going up would be the next step to taking this rebuild forward. It’s a huge day for the club and the players in their careers. This might be the only opportunity they get for a promotion in their lives.”

With a fully-fit squad to choose from, Westren and Goldsmith have some tough selection calls to make.

He added: “During the season you take into account the bigger picture such as giving a player a rest when needed or choosing certain players for certain opponents, but this is a one-off game that every player should want to play in. But there will be some players that won’t play that will be expecting to and that’s unfortunate, but it’s the nature of sport. We’d like to pick everyone but we can’t.”

A vocal home crowd will no doubt pack out the ground and Westren admits their presence is a big help.

He said: “We’re very lucky as a club, if you go to other teams in the league you might only get 50 but we normally get about 500, so that’s a huge bonus for us and they might not be used to that, so its a double edged sword and hopefully it can work in our favour.

“We want to get back to a level where the club should be. Historically, we’ve always punched above our weight and it’s time for us to start doing that again.”

Skipper Lloyd Duke has issued a rallying cry for the town to head to Polson Bridge.

He said: “As a team, we urge anyone, even if you’re not overly interested in rugby, to come down and create a brilliant atmosphere to hopefully get the win and secure promotion.”