28 July, Sky Sport match

As a Sky Television game this certainly lived up to the billing. Shirley began the game with a clear game plan and ruthless defence. They opened the scoring with a try within the first five minutes after capitalising on St Bede’s mistakes.The next few minutes saw St Bede’s threaten the Shirley line but were unable to breach their defence and at times lacked the patience to finish off some promising opportunities. Shirley added another penalty and went into the halftime with an 8-0 lead. Shirley again started well and scored a second converted try to give them a commanding 15-0 lead. This seemed to galvanise St Bede’s into action and for the first time in the game they had a steady supply of ball and began to make inroads into the Shirley defence. They were rewarded with a very good try to Captain Dominic Gardiner converted by Sky player of the game, Kynan Stowers-Smith. Kynan added a penalty a few minutes later to make the score 15 – 10. Shirley responded with a penalty of their own to further increase their lead to 18-10. With 10 minutes to go St Bede’s scored a great team try after some excellent support play and build up to Shadroch Sevele. The try was unconverted. Momentum was now with St Bede’s. They took the lead for the first time with a brilliant individual try to Eto Bainivalu, converted by Kynan 22-18. The final scoring play of the game was another penalty to Kynan ,25-18. Despite desperate Shirley attacking in the final minute the St Bede’s defence held on for a very good win. Two stand out players for St Bede’s were undoubtly Tadeo Andriani and George Methven.

Tries: Dominic Gardiner, Shadroch Sevele, Eto Bainivalu

Cons: Kynan Stowers- Smith (2)

Pens: Kynan Stowers -Smith (2)

Photo credit to Graeme Brankin