It’s not good for the “old ticker” watching Redruth – mind you the same can be said for the Cornish Pirates, especially after they managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory yesterday at Bristol – but despite the on-going defensive frailities it was good to see the class and pace of Welsh 7’s star Rhodri McAtee in a Redruth shirt. OK he may only be with Redruth for a couple of weeks, and lucky for him he hasn’t got to travel as Redruth have got two home games on the trot during his loan period, his first try was a piece of individual brilliance which perfectly illustrated his tag of “Welsh Whippet”. Taking the ball then setting off on a diagonal run cross-field, to run-around the defence as if they were statues, then plonk the ball down behind the try-line. Marvellous. His second was just as good, on-hand to take the pass from Chris Fuca (what a season he’s having again).
However, Rhodri’s magic can’t hide the fact that Redruth’s defence is quite frankly poor! Poor Dave Penberthy must be tearing his hair out as week in week out we seem to talk about the same problems but still the players seem to be committing the same errors week after week, why? Is the question that the Redruth faithful keep asking.
You can read my report from the game on the Trelawny’s Army site, just follow the link here.
While tapping away on my match report yesterday afternoon for the WEST BRITON (sorry you’ll have to wait until Thursday for that one!) I was glued to the radio listening to the Pirates match up at the Memorial Stadium against Bristol all looked to be going .Tries from Andrew Suniula a brace from all action hooker Dave Ward and another express special from Dave Doherty had the Pirates well in command after 50 minutes at 28-10. Despite scoring a fifth try from Cornishman Tom Kessell on at scrum-half for injured skipper Gavin Cattle, the Pirates let Bristol off the hook and back they came to sneak a very good win 37-33. Can’t imagine High Performace Manager Chris Stirling will have been too impressed with his team’s failure to secure the result, which is something they will need to do should they qualify for the final stages of the RFU Championship play-offs. Once again you can read the match report and quotes from Dick Straughan’s report for the Western Morning News in the link here quotes in this link.
The Cornish All Blacks continue to pull away from the bottom part of the table with a welcome 39-17 win over Barnes at Polson Bridge. Good to see our player of the year Ben Hilton on the scoresheet again with a couple of tries against the londoners. Dick Benson -Gyles report from the Western Morning News again in the link here
In Tribute South West 1 West, match of the day was at Camborne where the Cherry & Whites took on Wadebridge Camels running out comfortable winners by 37-6 with Joe Parma scoring three of Town’s six tries. Meanwhile Penryn lost at home to Avonmouth OB’s by 8-5, centre Will Payne getting the Borough’s try.
News from acoss the Tamar today as Plymouth Albion announce that Director of Rugby Graham Dawe and the club have parted company. Former Exeter Chiefs head coach Pete Drewett takes over at the Brickfields. I have nothing but total admiration for Dawsey for all he has achieved both as a player and coach and wish him well as I am sure all members of Trelawny’s Army do in whatever role he takes up next in rugby.