Fixture

The Magpies welcomed the Red and Blacks of Carmarthen Athletic to Parc y Mynydd Mawr on Saturday afternoon eager to break their 16-match losing streak and whilst they didn’t get the win, they did show plenty of guts and determination to secure a 12-12 draw and win the try scoring stats 2-0. The Athletic begun the game dominant in territorial advantage but without looking like getting over the Magpies try line. The Red and Blacks however took the lead after 10 minutes when they kicked a penalty to make it 0-3. Sixteen minutes later they doubled the lead when they added another penalty goal to make it 0-6. The Magpies were by this point slowly working their way back into the game and scored their first points after half an hour when centre Steffan Price went over wide out on the left after a nice counter attack started by full back Sam Jones and wing Aled Price. Steffan Price attempted the conversion of his own kick but the ball went wide of the upright from a narrow angle. Tumble were now very much in the game and young Aled Price on the wing looked sharp and eager to counter attack when every he received the ball, despite taking a couple of heavy knocks. Just before half time the Athletic were awarded another penalty and extended their lead to 5-9 which is how the score remained at the interval.

The second half started with both teams having opportunities before the Athletic extended their lead to 5-12 with yet another penalty goal after 51 minutes. Tumble were shooting themselves in the foot with some indiscipline that was giving the opportunity to the Athletic to kick penalties and open the scoring margin. The Magpies made the task even harder two minutes later when loose head prop Jordan Burrow was shown the yellow card for a perceived intentional knock down of an Athletic pass. Tumble however never threw in the towel and drove the ball continuedly at their opponents with some fine tight forward play and were given their just deserves on 63 minutes when number 8 Steffan Davies powered his way over the line from close-range near the posts after multiple pick up and drives. Steffan Price added the conversion to draw the scores level at 12-12, which is how it remained until the final whistle despite some committed play from the Magpies.

A unique moment happened in the second half when veteran prop Gareth Cavill replaced the sin binned Burrow and joined his son, hooker Sam in the front row. It wasn’t the win we so dearly wanted and the boys deserved but at least it wasn’t another defeat.

A copy of the matchday programme can be found at the following link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/11TZn_7IYcao4cxv8-w5-byAf3Vk-0Yva/view?usp=sharing

Next week the boys have the difficult trip to league leaders Penclawdd RFC, kick off is at 2.30pm come and support the boys.

Scorers:

Tries – Steffan Price, Steffan Davies

Conversion – Steffan Price

Ymlaen Y Piod