RLC Round 12. London Skolars 16 -v- 60 St Albans Centurions 12.07.08
St Albans Centurions travelled to North London on Saturday to take on the London Skolars with what coach Shane Rampling described as his strongest team yet - and he wasn't far wrong. Although the Cents have been plagued this season with injured players and unavailabilty, the squad for this game looked good from the outset, when within the first 10 minutes, prop Lewis Padmore got the ball 10 yards out and took three Skolars defenders over the line with him to score. Oli Fountain was unable to convert, and five minutes later the score was even when Skolars pulled an unconverted try back. On 15 minutes, chasing a kick down field, Oli Fountain leapt for the ball with several Skolars players in attendance, caught it and crossed the line to score. Jacques Steynberg was next on the scoresheet when he took the ball out on the wing and with a burst of speed, crashed through 2 tacklers and scored in the corner. Fountain then got the second of his two tries when , once again, chasing an Owen Doyle kick down field, he leapt head and shoulders above the London defenders and dropped over the try line for another 4 points. Then followed full back Owen Doyles '15 minutes of magic', when in the last quarter on the first half, the speedy full back, now returned to Cents after missing the first 10 weeks of the season, crossed the line three times in 15 minutes. At half time Cents were leading comfortably by 4 - 34.
The second half didn't start too well for Cents, when in the first minute, nippy half back James Raynor was hurt in a crunching three man tackle, followed shortly after by Oli Fountain who was on the receiving end of a four man tackle and then speed king Rudi van Der Merwe with a shoulder injury. Happily all players returned after treatment by the physio. The Skolars took this opportunity and scored when the Cents were still trying to organise themselves. Happily, Chris True, playing off the bench, returned things to normal when he took a superb long ball from Shane Rampling and left the Skolars in his wake as he crossed in the corner. Player coach Shane Rampling thought he should then get on the score board, and he did, twice in succession. First a crashing 60 yard run from the excellent Mike Okwusogu broke up the opposition, and a pass to Rampling saw him cross the line. Five minutes later Rampling took the ball at dummy half and jinked his way over the whitewash. It looked like the coach was going to get a hat trick, when with 15 minutes to go he was stopped 10 yards out, but a quick pass to Tom Martell saw the youngster force his way over and score. The last try of the game came from Jacques Steynberg again, when the flying South African took the ball on the Skolars 30m line, burst through three sets of tackles and scored a great try. Oli Fountain kicked 3 goals, as did Owen Doyle. Although only mentioning the scorers, it should be emphasised that this was a squad performance today, with great support from all the team. One amazing stat to come out was that in the whole game, only 6 mistakes were made by the Cents players. Final score, 16 - 60 to Cents with 12 tries scored.
Left, hat trick scorer Owen Doyle, right, Jacques Steynberg on his way to the line.
