Hard earned away win for Barry RFC (From Barry And District News)

Hard earned away win for Barry RFC

7:50am Thursday 28th January 2010

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PENYGRAIG 8 BARRY 20

BARRY RFC travelled to the Rhondda on Saturday for their first game in some months.

It was expected to be a difficult fixture - and so it proved.

Initially Penygraig showed more appetite for the game than the visitors. Within a few minutes of the start they were rewarded with a penalty, the award of which put both teams on notice that the forte of the referee was control around the tackle area.

Barry responded well and good line kicking, especially by Lee from the base of the scrum, led to an equalising penalty by Cummings.

Barry were having considerable difficulty in securing ball from the lineouts, but when the ball was made available to them, the backs showed their mettle with some good attacking work featuring full-back Ryan coming into the line.

Penygraig were having the better of exchanges and were full value for the lead they established on the half-hour mark. This was through an excellent try scored by their second row, who sold the Barry defence an outrageous dummy - Barry should not assume a mere forward is incapable of such skills!

With the half-time score 8-3 in favour of Penygraig, it was essential that Barry put much more effort and concentration into their play for the second half.

Whatever was said during the interval, it had the required effect in that there was a dramatic improvement all-round. The Barry forwards turned an early scrummage through 90 degrees and won the ensuing penalty.

They also were much more disciplined than their opponents, who lost several attacking positions and hard earned territory by querying the decisions of the referee. This resulted in two further successful penalties converted by the captain.

After half an hour the visitors scored a very well taken try, which culminated in Brown giving the final pass for Ryan to score at the corner. The distance and angle for the conversion were just too much for success.

The final score came deep into injury time with another fine penalty by Cummings.

There were several worrying aspects of Barry’s play. The first half was uniformly dismal with a lack of clear direction and leadership. The line-out performance was poor throughout, which appeared to be as a result of lack of co-ordination between thrower and catcher.

On the positive side were the two Ds.

The second half showed what this Barry team is capable of, especially in defence with no points conceded after the turn-round. A very encouraging aspect was the discipline exhibited from start to finish, which was reflected in a very able referee awarding many more penalties to Barry than to the opposition.

Next game is at home to Cowbridge this Saturday, kick-off 2.30pm.

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