Fixture

The Magpies welcomed Pembrokeshire side Fishguard & Goodwick RFC to Parc y Mynydd Mawr on Saturday afternoon for this rearranged Division 2 West fixture. Starting the day bottom of the table Tumble were looking to put in a performance to try and kick start their stuttering season. The game started evenly with the Seagulls taking the lead after three minutes with a penalty kick and the Magpies then having the opportunity to level the score on six minutes with a penalty attempt from outside half Mitch Jones which hit the upright. At this point the game was fairly even with both sides moving the ball and having opportunities, however Fishguard broke the defensive line on 12 minutes to score a try wide out on the left. The conversion was missed making the score 0-8 to the visitors. A couple of minutes later Jones was successful with his second penalty attempt to get the Magpies on the score board and make the score 3-8. Tumble were well in the game at this point and with Fishguard having a scrum deep in their half the Magpies looked to capitalise. Unfortunately, despite pushing the Seagulls pack back their number 8 managed to gather the ball and break 60 metres up field. The ball was then worked out wide for their wing to score another try wide out on the left. The conversion was added by the Fishguard ten to make the score 3-15 to the visitors. Now we entered a crazy period in the game where a combination of heads going down, good play by Fishguard and curious decisions by the man in the middle saw Tumble concede three quick fire tries to go into the break 3-32 down.

Much like the youth team down in Pembroke the boys had a choice to make at half-time: allow Fishguard to rack up the points or dust themselves down and show the true character of the team. Within 37 seconds of the restart we had the answer for which option the boys had taken when centre Scott Jones forced his way over the try line near the posts. Unfortunately, the conversion was missed but the team now had their tails up with an obvious change in performance levels from the first half. Ten minutes later the Magpies had further reduced the deficit when scrum half Iwan Morgan used his power to get over the whitewash right under the sticks. Mitch Jones made no mistake with the conversion to make the score 15-32. Changes were made to the Magpies front row with Jordan Burrow and big Ifan Samuel coming on as substitutes which signalled a dominance at scrum time. Repeatedly the Seagulls scrum was pushed back on their own line before the referee blew for a penalty try on the 21-minute mark much to the disappointment of skipper Steffan Owen who looked sure to get the touchdown anyway. The score was now 22-32 and with around 20 minutes to go the dream of taking the lead was within sight. A rare attack by Fishguard into the Magpies 22 saw them awarded a scrum. At the resultant set-piece a slip in the Tumble front row saw the referee immediately award a free kick from which the Seagulls forced their way over for a try much against the run of play which opened the score back up to 22-39 with only 14 minutes of the game remaining. This score took the wind out of Tumble’s sails and the tempo of the game died down for around five minutes. The Magpies had a couple of chances to score before replacement second-row Ryan Lewis forced his way over in the right-hand corner after a superb rolling maul. Mitch Jones kicked a superb conversion to make the score 29-39. Despite coming close, the Magpies could not again get on the score sheet and were eventually beaten when the referee sounded the whistle for fulltime.

A copy of the matchday programme can be found at the following link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/11xtbDQsrg0u_V8SU-nl9UJPUQo-zdRe4/view?usp=sharing

The boys now have a week off before the visit to Mumbles RFC on Saturday, 10 November. The team need to take confidence from the second half performance when they showed what they can do both individually and collectively. Hopefully we can start putting in performances like the second half for 80 minutes rather than allow the opposition to build a considerable lead and then start playing.

Scorers:

Tries – Scott Jones, Iwan Morgan, Penalty Try, Ryan Lewis

Conversions – Mitch Jones x2

Penalty – Mitch Jones

Line -up:

15. Sam Jones, 14. Sion Allen, 13. Steffan Price, 12. Scott Jones, 11. Kieran Spain, 10. Mitch Jones, 9. Iwan Morgan; 1. Dafydd Humphreys, 2. Rhys Lewis, 3. Kieron Richards, 4. Nathan Willard, 5. Gareth Armstrong, 6. Liam Willard, 7. Darren Williams, 8. Steffan Owen ©; Subs: 16. Sam Cavill, 17. Ifan Samuel, 18. Jordan Burrow, 19. Ryan Lewis, 20. Dion Gealy

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