News
CUARLFC 52 Exeter ‘A’ 0
After two weeks of false starts with the weather beating the club for both the notts trent match and the super league curtain raiser against st.helens u-20’s it was touch and go whether cambridge could host exeter who would have to travel 6 hours to play the game.Exeter travelled up to cambridge the night before the game and showed that they intended to give it their best shot and with some recognizable faces from the 1st grade team it would be a good challenge for the blues.The blues team was much changed again from the team that defeated sheffield uni two weeks ago but the two preceding training sessions had been of such quality that there were great expectations from the players about their performance.The blues started well and posted the first try after 4 minutes but exeter exerted good pressure at the ruck and forced errors which were not part of the plan the team had set themselves.Exeter had good ball sets on a number of occasions and battered at the blues line but good shape , tackle technique and aggression thwarted the men from the wild west.As the hald wore on the tempo of the game moved up a gear for the blues and two more converted tries followed giving a half time scoreline of 18 - 0 to cambridge.
The players knew at half time that this was not good enough and resolved to tighten up possession and complete some sets to get back to the plan and then with good field position the chances would come.A try at the beginning took the air out of any exeter revival and the tries flowed with regularity being turned into 6 pointers by some great conversions from all parts of the ground.A spell of niggle from exeter could not knock the blues out of their stride and they finished the job with a last minute try from Wingate- Saul giving a final scoreline of CUARLFC 52 Exeter 0.
Old head , James Shearman was happy with the performance of his teammates , “It was good to play alongside lads who are new to league this season and you can see how far they have come since october.We needed to get a game under our belts after two weeks without one but the training we have been able to concentrate during that period has expanded the options of the team in all parts of the field.We can take heart in this performance but we still need to improve over the next three weeks to make sure we are firing on all cylinders.“
Coach Evans was happy with the transfer from training ground to gameday , “ We have done a lot of work on the links from ruck to edge and it was a little rusty at first and that was in no small part to the commitment of the exeter team but as soon as we could work in some space after our go forward was clicking in , it was good to see tries scored down both sides of the field and through the ruck.Defensively we were 8 out of 10 and no player came off the field patting themselves on the back.They are challenging themselves and each other to out perform the previous match and training session and they are hungry to improve which is all you can ask for as a coach.“
Scorers.
Tries. Cushing(4) , A.Sanders (2) , Shearman , Linton , Wingate-Saul.
Cons.Cushing (8)