RN SENIOR XV TOUGH LAST GAME BEFORE THEY FACE THE ARMY
It was never going to be an easy game for the RN Senior XV as they travelled to The Rec for the re-established fixture with Bath FC.
Last season had seen the Senior XV perform well against a well drilled professional side, losing eventually 36-13 with the Navy pushing the Bath team all the way to the final whistle.
This must have given the Bath coaching team a few sleepless nights, as this season they made sure they would not allow the Navy to put them under the same pressure or allow the Navy to be in the lead at half time.
In order to do this Bath placed the Navy under a barrage of attacks from the kick-off and sped into a lead that the Navy where unable to close as Bath led at half time by 42-0.
The second half was going to be just as hard as the first for the Navy Team. Even with POAET (Marsh) Cormack (RNAS Culdrose) coming off the bench to add his lineout mastery and experience to the team, Bath continued to score.
LPT (Jonny) Stephen (BRNC) starting at scrum half, whose snipes through the smallest gaps with the support of skipper for the night LET (WESM) (Ian) Cooper (HMS Collingwood), could breach the Bath defensive line.
The loss of ET (ME) (Sam) Davies (HMS Drake) in the centre led to a reshuffle of the backline, AET (Jon) Humphrey (845 NAS) moved from stand-off to his normal position at Full Back, AB (Tom) Davies (HMS Illustrious) now to his usual position of centre and on came Mne (Nathan) Huntley (30 Cdo IX Gp) into the driving seat at 10.
The best move of the night for the Navy saw Mne (Jack) Foster (40 Cdo RM) use his pace and quick footwork to carve through a Bath defence to score the Navy's only try which was duly converted by Huntley. Making the final score 77-7 to Bath.
DoR Cdr (Andy) Kellett RN said of the game ‘It was a huge lesson for the guys in power, pace and intensity on the rugby field. Although we struggled to compete, the team will take away some individual lessons on how to be more competitive at this level and focus on next week. After recovery, we will continue our preparation for out next game, fine tune the game plan and enjoy the build up to final game of the season at Twickenham. The team are very excited to hear that ticket sales are on course for another record crowd this year, which will be a massive motivating factor.'
Tickets for the Army v Navy match are still on site at www.navyrugbyunion.co.uk