St Albans Centurions

This week saw several rounds of Master's style rugby league.

First we will visit the midweek fixture:

Tuesday 20th July marked an historic day in the development of rugby league in London and the South, when a London select side took on the touring Australians at Master Rugby League. Master Rugby League, developed in Australia, is a variant of the sport designed for over 35s, whereby players wear different coloured shorts dependent on their age, the colour of shorts defining the intensity of tackling allowed. Gold shorts are for over 60s and the Australian side had several players in their 80s !

The concept of Masters is very new to the London area with several clubs, including St Albans Centurions looking to start up sides, the emphasis very much being on inclusion and fun. Selected as part of this landmark fixture were Centurions founder members Ken Edwards ad Gary Tetlow along with one of the clubs first ever players Steve Kenworthy (whose son now players for the clubs u13s). The London side notably included Sky Sports rugby league officionado and former GB hooker Mike ‘Stevo’ Stephenson.

The game itself was played in blistering hot conditions at Medway Barracks and both sides deserve credit for the quality of rugby league and fine sportsmanship on show. The Aussies recoded a 5 try to nil victory, Ken taking the Man of the Match award for the London select team and Steve being sin binned for a rather robust tackle on a gold shorted Aussie !

Starting off with the Centurions Junior summer events, and followed by a belated match report from the U13's play-off game.

Staines U13's v Cents U13's

HT Score 30 - 8
FT Score 48 - 20

Tries from Will Curtis x 3 & Callum Porter x 1 + conrversions x 2 Nikolas Gaspar

Team-

1.Charlie Dollard
2.Chris Seaborne
3. Joseph Harrison
4.Callum Porter
5.Kelvin Owusu
6. Will Curtis
7.Jarred Kenworthy
8.Micah Passman
9.Jack Mason
10.Declan Allen
11.Richard Mills
12.John Liu
13.Mikolas Gaspar
14.Harrison Camp
15. Kasey Burroiughs-Thompson

Cents started well on what was a very hot day with a try in the first 5 minutes from Will Curtis coming from a well worked move to score in the corner.

Staines hit back with 6 tries on the bounce all pretty much coming from our mistakes.
The Second half was a lot more of an even contest with tries being exchanged and some excellent ball work from Nikolas Gaspar to send in Will Curtins for a further try.

In the end Stained ran out deserved winners.
Cents MOM of the mtach Nikolas Gaspar for excellent defensive work and tremendous conversions from our tries, 2 from 2 kicks.

This end Cents U13's season, good work lads on a hard fought season.

Hammersmith Hill Hoists 16 -V- 56 St Albans Centurions

Saturday the Cents travelled to West London to play the Hoist who are the only team to beat the Cents this season. Hammersmith put pressure on the Cents from the kick off. This did not help by the Cents giving away 5 penalties in 6 minutes. But it was the Cents who opened the scoring from a penalty for interference at play the ball the Cents finally got away from their half due to strong running from the forwards. On the 5th tackle a gap

Anyone wishing to travel to the game against Hammersmith.

Kick-Off: 2:30pm

Venue: Wasps RUFC Training Centre Twyford Park Acton W3 9QA

Nearest Tube Ealing Common a 4 minute walk.

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St Albans Centurions 42 -V- 22 Ipswich Rhinos/b>

St Albans Centurions turned on a second half super show against their visitors from Ipswich, as they maintained top spot in the RLC Premier South. Recent fixtures between the two rivals have been close fought and feisty affairs, and with temperature exceeding 30oC this fixture was never likely to be any different.

Cents, missing Andy Lake and Rudi van der Mewre both on international duty, as well as Roy Dube and Oli Fountain, got he ball rolling on 5 mins. when the mercurial Matt O’Rourke benefited from an Adam Kal blindside move from the base of a scrum and raced in from 30 metres, Andy John missing the conversion. It wasn’t long before Rhinos got into some rhythm taking advantage of Cents mistakes, their first try coming from a Russ Kellaway fumble on his own line, Adam Cook the beneficiary and then on 18mins a Cents knock on gifted the ball to Matt Harwood who raced in and with Pete LeMarquand converting both Cents were down 12-4. This turnaround stung a response from the Cents and they benefited from their kick off going into touch and direct from the resulting scrum powerhouse forward Joe Shaw smashed his way over, John converting.