Sat 9 Oct 2021
The Cornish All Blacks were fully aware of the task that faced them on their fourth away game of the season; an extremely well drilled team that had arguably the best scrummaging unit in the league.
As a coaching unit, we opted to go for a very strong scrummaging front row with a very mobile back five with the premise to play at high tempo and utilise the pace we had out in the backs and also the kicking game of Adam Collings and James Tucker in the half back roles. First half we were very much playing according to those key areas; lineout was providing good ball, the backs were getting plenty of ball in hand and causing a great deal of metres, in attack and panic in the Weston defence. The scrum was, however, just starting to be put under some heat and a few unnecessary penalties (not rolling away and clear out lines) were just giving Weston some ball and they were able to prevent us from playing at out tempo.
With 35 minutes gone, Weston were down to 13 men and the CABs were 13-10 up (lovely team try finished by Dan Pearce and the boot of James) and this is where the game was, in essence, won by Weston. They managed to hold us out, work some penalties down the field and end up on our 5 metre line. A team yellow card, for Daniel Goldsmith, brought the power play back to Weston a little and they capitalised. By the time, he returned the scoreline now read 22-13 to the home side and Weston's scrum was seriously causing issues for the CABs pack, Weston's lineout was functioning equally as well as ours and the half became very much living off scraps and played in our half.
The last five minutes of the game, we were able to get some control and possession and eventually worked our way over (Daniel Goldsmith crashing over from short range) to make the scoreline a respectable, if flattering 29-20. The key lesson, that was taken away, was the value of keeping the ball so that a team plays at the tempo that suits them and causes most issues for their opponents.
