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Manchester victory makes it four out of five for men’s rugby

November 12, 2009
Leigh Clarke

Photograph by Jason Lozier

UNIVERSITY OF YORK FIRSTS 36
UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER SECONDS 15

BUCS League 1A – Wednesday 11th November

No one quite wants to say it yet, but for the second year running something special is happening within the York men’s rugby firsts. The wins might not be pretty but, with today’s 36-15 win over Manchester seconds, they have now won four of their five fixtures in Northern Conference 1A. As Captain Alexander Redshaw said after today’s match: “This was another week, with another win. We now know we can do well in this division. This team has a lot of potential.”

Yet it was not as simple as the scoreline suggests. Mistakes and some questionable refereeing decisions meant York were not able to pull away until midway through the second-half. Tom Weir bundled the ball over the line after the fifth of a series of scrums on the five metre line, to give the home side a 22-15 lead. It was a key turning point in the match especially as, in one of the preceding scrums, Manchester had a player binned for a blatant offside. Shortly after William Forsythe took the ball from a line–out and, despite bafflingly not passing to an open Tim Walker, found Rupert Grant who scored. Rob Grant converted to put the game beyond the visitors.

York have beaten Liverpool, Durham, Northumbria and now Manchester to sit second in BUCS League 1A. Photograph by Jason Lozier.

It had not looked as if it would be so easy for York in the first-half. After a sloppy start – they had conceded two penalties in the opening two minutes – Rupert Grant received the ball from the scrum and offloaded to Alistair Handy who found a gap in the defence and put York ahead.

If York thought they had steadied their nerves, they were wrong. A Tom Buggé knock-on gave Manchester a scrum, from which they then won a penalty. Despite missing, they gained possession straight from the restart and, after a quick passing move, scored their first try. Again York seemed to gain control, attacking and nearly bundling over the line with a five metre scrum, but a poor pass was picked up by the Manchester outside centre who ran the length of the pitch to score.

Yet two tries from scrum-half Walker were to put York into the lead. The first also came as a result of a scrum near the try line. In a moment of confusion, York pushed their opponents over the line but lost the ball momentarily. Walker grabbed the ball and, with Grant’s conversion, the scores were level. Moments before York had appeared to have scored through Mike James, after a great run down the wing from Ed Drewett, but the referee surprised both teams by disallowing the try for a double movement, after James had been clipped by a defending player.

York should have scored more than 36 points, but were let down by some contentious refereeing decisions. Photograph by Jason Lozier.

It was one of a number of controversial decisions that, it could be argued, cost York points. Richard Bremner seemed to be through shortly after but the pass from Walker was surprisingly adjudged to have gone forward. Even stranger was the disallowing of Weir’s touch down even though the ball was clearly on the line. However, from the resulting scrum Walker touched down again to put York into the lead going into half-time.

An early converted Manchester penalty, after Jones was penalised for not rolling away, seemed to have put the pressure right back on York, yet it was to be the last points they scored all afternoon. Despite, as Redshaw conceded, York’s backs never “reaching their full potential” a second try from Rupert Grant, after taking the ball from his namesake and running flat out until he got to the line, made the score look impressive.

York Line-up: 1. Ben Innes, 2. James Stone, 3. Rupert Grant, 4. William Forsythe, 5. Alexander Redshaw (c), 6.Alistair Handy, 7. Rory McGregor, 8. Tom Weir, 9. Tim Walker, 10. Rob Grant, 11. Richard Bremner, 12. Gryffudd Jones, 13. Mike James, 14. Ed Drewett, 15. Tom Buggé

Subs: William Felgate, Jordan Crosse, Rich Welsh, Ryan Johnston