Sat 2nd Nov, 2:30pm. Ards 4ths -League 20 – 0 LARNE
Black Knights remain unbeaten!
by STEPHEN NUTT
Last Saturday the Black Knights welcomed Larne 3rd XV to Hamilton Park for a league match that was played in surprisingly good conditions bearing in mind the prevailing weather conditions. The match was a competitive one and proved to be something of a g
Larne turned out a young, enthusiastic and aggressive side and with numerous interventions from the referee Ards found it difficult to get into their rhythm during the first half.
Ards played towards Scrabo Tower in the first half and into a fairly strong breeze. The home side dominated both possession and territory, but the Larne defence was resolute.
Some excellent relieving kicks from their out half who made full use of the conditions kept Ards from making an early break through. Ards took several scrums against the head in the opening quarter but for the remainder of the half, scrums became something of a lottery with the referee penalising both sides on numerous occasions.
Ards almost broke the deadlock after 18 minutes. The ball was recycled by the pack through several phases causing problems for the Larne defence. Chris Allen and Stephen Bell worked the ball out wide where it was taken on by Phil Gill. His pass to Gordy McBride was well timed but the covering defence bundled the Ards man into touch.
With Nigel Lynch and David Algie dominating the line outs, Ards played most of the remaining quarter of the first half in the opposition’s territory. Perhas a little more patience would have borne fruit but credit to the Larne defence which stood firm.
At the half time whistle the teams were deadlocked at 0 – 0 but some well directed words from Captain Stephen Bell seemed to galvanise the team into more productive efforts in the second half.
In the 50th minute Stephen Bell stroked over a penalty from just outside the 22 metre line and to the right of the posts to give Ards a well deserved 3-0 lead. Still dominating possession, Ards showed more control and desire to put together several phases of play in the appropriate parts of the pitch to keep Larne on the back foot.
A catch and drive from a line out some 30 metres out eventually saw the ball passed to Simon Crowe at inside centre and he cleverly side stepped two tackles to score under the posts. Bell added the conversion and Ards now had a healthy 10-0 lead.
Ards found themselves playing with more freedom from this point on. A clever chip through from the redoubtable Chris Allen was followed up by the same player. He surprised himself and his teammates by showing considerable pace to get his hand to the ball first and got the touch down to bring Ards their second try of the afternoon. The conversion went astray but just a few minutes later Stephen Bell used the wind to his team’s advantage by drilling the ball deep into Larne territory.
With a clean take in the line out and the rolling maul being used to good effect, the ball was eventually moved wide and into the hands of Gordy McBride. He came onto the ball at pace and went round the Larne right winger to extend the Ards lead to 20-0. With conditions deteriorating, this provided the be the final score of the game with Ards securing valuable league points against a Larne side which will almost certainly cause problems for quite a few teams in the league.
The Ards team for the match was: David Savage, Gareth Paden, Gary Dempsey, philip gill, David Algie, Brian McFarland, Nigel Lynch, MICHAEL CREIGHTON, Chris Allen, Stephen Bell (Capt), Andrew Todd, Simon Crowe, Trevor Spence, John McCartney, Gordy McBride, Andrew Fletcher, Paul Greggan.
