The American South rugby team began their 2014 N.A.C.R.A (North American Caribbean Rugby Association) title defense with a hard fought 33-6 victory over the visiting Bermuda national team at Life University last Saturday. The match was the first pool game in the round of three with the winner progressing to the Caribbean championship game on June 28th.
The game played in excellent conditions was as a physical clash as you could see with both teams involved in heavy contacts for the duration of the match.
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A total penalty count of 32 for the game punctuated the event, with no real flow patterns emerging from both teams due to ill-discipline at the tackle and numerous scrum infringements.
The South opened the scoring at the 4th minute with a wide range mid distance attempt by fly half Lucas Baistrocchi that bisected the posts for South to lead 3 nil. Bermuda played their kicking card all day and were able to apply pressure for territory scoring two penalties in the space of five minutes, the second successful to tie up the scores 3-3.
The Panthers were guilty of poor ball retention in the tackle with many possession lost due to poor entry and presentation at the ruck. This failure to protect the ball resulted in further penalties and gave the visitors more shots on goal this time successful to take the lead 6-3.
It took until the 22nd minute before the South backs were able to launch a meaningful raid that resulted in star winger Ty Elkins busting through many would be tackles to get to the line before generously offloading to flanker Ben Paul who supported well all day. The try converted and South led 10-6.
The remainder of the stanza saw both teams repeatedly infringe and turn over the ball, resulting in no real attack, the physicality of the game took its toll and both teams were sucked into a heavy forward orientated battle. The South scrum was under pressure all day from the more experienced Bermuda eight and continually struggled to supply clean first phase ball to the backline. The only phase ball that was clean came from the South’s dominant lineout.
Early into the second half the Panthers began to string some better sustained pressure on Bermuda and eventually turned this into points when again Elkins jinked and busted his way through many tacklers to score and excellent individual try that was converted by Baistrocchi to take the margin to 17-6. A further penalty goal was logged when Baistrocchi nailed one from the side line to increase the lead to 20-6.
The next ten minutes of play had the South team without inside center Tom Snow who was binned as a result of repeated infringements by the Panthers at the ruck. The South lifted their game to compensate for the loss, and were able to kick two further penalty goals and extend the lead to 26-6 in this period.
With still several minutes and injury time accrued the South continued to threaten the line and forwards man of the match Army Select hooker Ben Paul was rewarded for a great support game of rugby scoring in dying minutes, Baistrocchi kicked the conversion to leave him with a 7 from 7 tally for the day and a final of 33-6 to the Panthers.
For the South, Elkins was outstanding as was Paul. Special mention to new captain Stephen Hickey who took the reigns from Derek Wolfe and turned in a real captain’s knock. The South were let down by poor mechanics at the breakdown today not enabling the red hot back line to get front foot ball and exploit their deception and pace. This is something the squad will review and repair before the round three Caymans clash away next month.