By Brian Gibbs-Ripley

 

 

Penryn Saracens travelled to play St Ives 2nds full of anticipation after a good start to the season which read played 3 won 3 with only twelve points and two tries conceded to date. However, despite the good start to the season it was noted that sterner challenges lay ahead and so it proved with the bubble burst in a big way at St Ives.

 

The St Ives team of last season it has to be said appeared stronger than the one faced this time out which made the resulting defeat that much harder to understand. Last years St Ives side had a larger pack of forwards than the current outfit and the backs were certainly sharper and more together. Despite this, Penryn managed to incur a far heavier defeat mainly due to some abject defending with players not performing the most basic of defensive skills in tackling opponents around the legs. Many of the St Ives tries were the direct result of some poor and, in cases, non existent high tackling which proved totally ineffective against a strong running St Ives team.

 

St Ives seemed to be strengthened by the presence of what seemed to be a number of very useful players who should be playing first team rugby. One replacement looked very much like Neil Corin, a most capable forward, previously of Redruth. If this was, indeed, Corin, then Penryn should have no complaints as he is a player who has graced the field at a high level but appeared to play well within himself and did not attempt to impose his obvious physical presence and ball skills on the Penryn outfit, which is a credit to him. Similarly the game was played in a sporting nature with no evidence of foul play from either side, which, again is to the credit of both teams.

 

As regards the game itself, Penryn went into a 3 nil lead courtesy of a Jake Seviour penalty after twenty minutes. This was probably against the run of play as St Ives had dominated the forward exchanges and only poor handling had prevented a score. St Ives came back with three unconverted tries to take the score to 15 – 3 at half time. The second half was one-way traffic with St Ives running in six more unconverted tries to take their final score to 45 points. Penryn replied with a try by Will Paine following a charged down St Ives kick near their own line. Jake Seviour converted.

 

The St Ives pack dominated the forward exchanges throughout with the young Penryn eight suffering as a result of not having enough big forwards. Penryn struggled at the set piece and contact area, which meant that there was little ball available for any constructive rugby.

 

Centre, Will Paine, showed good commitment and was one of the few to make a number of telling tackles. In the pack the two young props, Isaac Fields and Aaron Cockerell tried their best. Two regular first team players in Jordan Smith and George Jones at hooker and flanker respectively were unable to shore up the defence despite manful effort to do so.

 

So what can Penryn Saracens learn from this defeat? Probably the first lesson is that victory over less able teams counts for nothing against a side capable of competing at this level. Secondly, it is essential to maintain team spirit and tackle opponents on the gain line. There are indeed even sterner challenges ahead and it will be interesting to see which players in the squad are willing and able to respond.

 

This was a disappointing result but Penryn can have no complaints having been outplayed in every department by a very powerful St Ives team.

 

Team: J Seviour, T Ashe, Jason Smith, W Paine, S Slater, J Preston, T Day, A Cockerell, Jordan Smith, I Fields, S Hughes, R Hancock, G Jones, R Trevaskis, M Collett    Replacements: J Jowett, T Tullen, A Gibbs –Ripley, A Richards

 

Score: St Ives 45 (nine tries) Penryn 10 (one try, a conversion and penalty)

 

Scorers Penryn: Paine (try), Seviour (penalty and conversion)