This Emeraude Lines JRA league fixture, played on a bitterly cold afternoon at Les Quennevais, saw some tremendous runs from both sets of packs, occasional glimpses of individual excellence from the likes of Simon Gilley for Les Quennevais and Jim McCormick and Nick Trower for Banks, and four well-worked tries which showed that ‘junior’ rugby is an inappropriate description for a game like this.It was far more entertaining than Saturday’s win by the JRFC’s 1st XV against Old Blues and, as a spectacle, must have pleased the 30 or so spectators who braved the wintry conditions to watch it.The first try, to Banks, was scored by blindside flanker Ed O’Brien who made the most of his forwards’ pressure before, in the dying moments of the first half, Bill Green equalised by tapping the ball to himself, after Les Quennevais were awarded a penalty, and darting over.Going into the break with a score of 5-5 and with the wind very much in their favour, Les Quennevais should have penned the Banks in their own 22 for most of the second half.As it was, the Bankers survived an early blitz when Roy Le Lièvre powered over following good hands from Gary Rousseau and Peter Deffains, and were worth their last try of the match, when their pack secured decent ball which was fed along the line for Harry Chamberlain to score wide out on the left.A scoreline of 10-10 doesn’t do either team any favours in terms of their winning the league, but that scoreline reflected a game which saw two industrious, hard-working teams battle manfully for 80 minutes with no foul play, a lot of heart, and some very attractive, good, clean, running rugby to enjoy.Meanwhile, at St Peter, Guernsey 2nds showed that they have the potential to be there or thereabouts at the top of the league come the end of the season.They beat Beeches 33-17 comfortably in the end, with tries by Mark Jones (2), Andy Bailey (2) and Paul Livesey, with Alec Bailey converting one of them and also slotting over two penalties.Beeches’ points came from Ben Tipper, Andy Dawson and Gary Osborne while Peter Stockley added a conversion.The half-time score was 17-5 to Guernsey.Although Beeches fielded a weakened team because of absences/injury, Guernsey more than matched them in the forwards and are now closing in on them, and other teams, at the head of the table.With Jersey 2nds winning 14-10 against St Jacques in Guernsey, the race to top the league is proving quite difficult to predict; any team which wins three games in a row at the start of 2004 could easily steal the title.
