Newark Too Strong For Panthers
When you arrive at a club and are welcomed by enough car parking attendants to form their own team you know that you are in for a tough day at the office!
Chesterfield Panthers U15s welcomed Leo Rogers and Finn Davis from the U14s into their fold for the trip to Newark this weekend.
Their presence gave Panthers a full 15 man squad, and was greatly appreciated.
Warm autumn sunshine was the order of the day for kick off and saw Panthers make a good, positive start. Both sides attacked and defended well but with no overall gain of territory for some 10 minutes or so.
The weather then took a turn for the worse with a heavy bout of rain and a biting wind making conditions very difficult indeed. Numerous knock ons and handling errors led to a succession of scrums which Newark probably just edged overall. This finally gave them some momentum and coupled with a few defensive errors from Panthers at key moments allowed them to show their talent, especially from Number 8 and Fly Half.
By the 20 minute break Newark had run in 3 tries, converting 2 of them to give a score of 19 -0.
Before the break point Panthers were unlucky to loose their left Wing, Elliot Davenport, who sustained a knee injury during the tackle which stopped another one of his trademark line breaks, seeing him make a clear 50 metres into the opposition's 22.
Early into the second 20 minute period Panthers finally managed to make inroads into Newark's half thanks to some good ball carrying runs from second row, Saul Whitehead and captain, Harvery Sturman, playing today at Number 8. A second period of possession resulting in a missed penalty kick to the corner saw Newark carry the ball over their line and hand Panthers a 5 metre scrum. However they were unable to turn any of the pressure into points.
The rest of the match saw much of the same story. The weather continued to chop and change, more territory gained by runs from centre , Leo Rogers, wing Elloit Sears-Piccavey and flanker Tom McGovern gave Panthers both scrum and lineout possession in good field positions, but ultimately came to nothing, despite accurate lineout throwing in from Toby Woolgar -Norton as none of the set piece moves came off.
Panthers again made some fierce tackles at times only to be offset by them loosing concentration and defensive shape which allowed Newark to regularly add to their points tally throughout the game.
A final score of 43 -0 does not really accurately reflect the fact that Panthers played well overall against a very strong opposition.