Ravens Strike Early, Ravens 34 – Caps 18: Report by Peter MacDonald
On a cool November day at Jericho the crowd were looking forward to a tight game as the Ravens were hosting a Caps team that had just knocked off the Lomas the previous weekend. And the Caps came out strongly in the early going pressuring the Ravens at their line but ultimately settling for 3 points from a penalty kick by fullback Mike Moloney. Unexpectedly though by the 20 minute mark the Ravens had put up four tries and had a 22-6 lead, a 16 point differential that remained at the final whistle.
All four tries came as the Ravens were attacking left to the open side with three of the tries coming through or around the Caps’ backfield. Centre Tsugu Hirai scored first cutting back against the grain, then left winger Cole Keffer tallied having been handed a big overlap, followed by a forwards try heading left from short range and finally fullback Noah Bain took advantage of a gap and finished off the bonus point try. With the Caps’ usual centre Melani Nenai playing left wing and Johnny Franklin on the bench after his Canada 7s trip to Trinidad there appeared to be a little less resistance in the Caps’ backfield than was anticipated.
There was no further scoring in an even second 20 minutes which was marked by a short scuffle amongst the forwards and later the loss to the Caps of lock Reid Davis through injury.
The Caps strong play after the break was rewarded at 50 minutes as they scored out wide left after a long miss pass with Moloney slotting the difficult conversion to tighten things up at 22-13. But soon the Ravens mauled in a try from a lineout with Grant Crowell touching down and at 62 minutes Aaron McLelland took off through a gap and sent Hirai in for his second of the day and quickly it was 34-13 Ravens. The Caps picked up a second try at 70 minutes as a Caps’ grubber was blocked by a Raven defender with the ball popping up nicely to centre Jack Adams who laid it off to his centre partner Ben Taylor for the try. And that was all she wrote.
The game was played at a high pace and apart from the early going it was tightly contested. There was a definite edge to the game both physically and verbally and as for the Ravens it appeared to be nothing new for the Welsh lads Joe Locke and Iwan Shenton. Jack Carson had a good outing at scrum half in the company of his two brothers Dave and James and his two cousins Don and Frank. Dave put in a good shift at flanker while also throwing in at the lineout. Scrum half Sam Reimer and hooker Jacob Bossi stood out in particular amongst the Caps for me.
Aaron McLelland is off to New Zealand for his wedding in January. Best wishes to Aaron and Robyn. Aaron has had a memorable career here in BC running with the ball like no other player I have witnessed in my 50 plus years taking in BC rugby. Like many we hope to see Aaron back and, if he is still keen, to one day see him take a place in the Canada 7s squad.
The Raven U18 squad will play for the BC U18 Championship against CW in Langford this Sunday. Good luck to the boys.
See you in the new year.