Paviors RFC

This weekend, Pavs opened their league campaign in Regional 2 with an away trip to Derby RFC. The two clubs have not met for some years, so an interesting game was in the offing for the gathered faithful of both clubs.

On an artificial surfaces the game always begins at a hot tempo. Unfortunately, as the half began, young scrum half was injured in a ruck and forced to leave the action. This disrupted Pavs somewhat, with Doug Billam moving to nine and another youngster, Owen Evans, entering on the wing and Josh Mallett to inside centre. On eight minutes, Pavs moved the ball well to the width for a lurking Owen Taylor to sprint in and give Pavs a 0-5 lead. Derby then narrowed the lead to 3-5 on twelve minutes, before scoring two quick fire tries from two Pavs errors on nineteen and twenty two minutes to go 15-5 up. It was clear that on this hard and very fast surface, turnovers inevitably led to scoring opportunities. On the half hour, Tom Ryan replaced Conner Tomlinson on the front row. A minute later,added to their score at 22-5. Five matters after this, Phil Eggleshaw fought his way over the Derby line following some excellent approach play to bring the score 22-10. Almost immediately, prop Tom Ryan was sent to the bin for a high tackle, this calling for Conner Tomlinson to return and Kyle Burney to depart for ten minutes. As the half drew to a close, Pavs brought things close as centre Adan Stokes outpaced the Derby defence to score and with the George Billam extras narrow matters to 22-17 at the break. 

 Almost immediately following the break, Ryan and Burney returned to the fray. Derby then added to their score to extend their lead to 29-17 with forty five minutes in the clock. Kaine Johnson replaced Joe Crossland in the second row. Pavs then scored following a well constructed attack and Ollie Anderson stepped his way through to bring the to 29-24 with the Billam extras and twenty five minutes to go. Disconcertingly, between seventy two and seventy five minutes  Derby scored three tries, two from Pavs errors to take their lead to 48-24. Pavs gathered themselves in the last five minutes and went close on several occasions, before Doug Billam eventually crossed the line to dob down and with more Billam extras take the score to 48-31 with minutes left. Even then Pavs almost added to their score at Phil Eggleshaw drove to the line and the official eventually signalled that the ball was held up and so ended the game with Pavs on top. 

All in all, not a bad first hit out of the season. Scrum half Jack Stanford’s unfortunate injury so early clearly affected Pavs attack in particular. There were times where they looked a dominant outfit, but too many errors in crucial positions gave Derby the opportunity to build in confidence and attack with pace on a fast artificial surface that they are used to. So lots to work on during the week. Next week, Pavs welcome Walsall RFC to The Stump. The West Midlands side also play on an artificial surface at home, so it is sure to be a high paced game. All support welcome, come and support the boys! 3.00 on kick off 

Squad

1.Dan Hyams

2.Owen Taylor (C,1try) *

3.Conner Tomlinson *

4.Joe Crossland *

5.Tom Platt

6.Kyle Burney *

7.Matt Molyneux *

8.Phil Eggleshaw (1 try) *

9.Jack Stanford *

10.George Billam (3C) *

11.Josh Mallett 

12.Doug Billam (1 try) *

13.Dan Stokes (1 try) *

14.Cole Mangham *

15.Ollie Anderson (1 try) *

16.Kaine Johnson

17.Owen Evans *

18.Tom Ryan 

* Home Grown player 

Forward of The Match -Tom Platt

Back of The Match - Doug Billam 

Nigel Youl 

1st XV Manager.