Longlevens Rugby 2nds made the short trip to play Old Cents RFC 2nds and come out with a comfortable victory but a lot to work on if they want to push on this season.
Longlevens started the game slowly and after giving away several penalties, the Cents game plan was obvious a narrow game using their big pack this resulted in pick and goes and eventually the scrum half dummying and going over from Close range. There was no panic as levens knew the big cents side would tire in the heat.
Longlevens get on the board after an off the top line out chip over the top by Zak Oliver was caught by Luke Stratford and offloaded to the returning Tom Barton to get his and Longlevens first score converted my Zak Oliver 5-7
From the restart Stratford was tackled in the air and resulted in a yellow card for the cents 7, this meant there was space out wide for Carlos Jenkins to make a nice break and a long pass out wide to Jaden Vance allowed him to score in the corner excellently converted by Zak Oliver 5-14
Levens were now finding gaps in the tiring cents defence and a lovely inside ball off the top of the line out allowed Tom Barton to get his second under the post converted my Zak Oliver 5-21 and this was the score at half time.
With Longlevens looking like they could get a big score the half time talk was to push on and keep running the cents players around the field.
Another early score in the second half from Tom Barton who got on the outside of his man and turned a few cents players inside out to score under the posts, scoring his third try of the game converted again my Zak Oliver 5-28.
Longlevens now made a lot of simple mistakes and allowed the big cents pack into the game this resulted in them scoring two close range tries of their own using their big forwards leavening the score 15-28
The last 20 minutes neither side really took control of the game with the weather conditions playing a big part as both teams were feeling the heat. But there was two more scores for Longlevens in the last 20 mins, first was from an inside pass from Zak Oliver to Henry Garner who made hard work of grounding the ball by smashing into the post but the try was given converted by Zak Oliver 15-35.
With the game coming to a close there was time for one further score from scrum half Henry York who chipped over the top and caught his kick on the bounce to run in under the sticks for the final score converted by Z Oliver final score 15-42.
It was a convincing enough win for Longlevens and means they get their first win of the season.
Next up is a home game against Ross on Wye RFC this Saturday which the boys will want to build some momentum.
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