Matty Williams

A far improved second half performance from the Knights, after a poor first half effort against a fired up Pirates side playing their first game at their ancestral home at the Mennaye Fields back in Penzance for five years, was not quite enough to earn them the bonus point that they probably felt they deserved.

For their opening Championship game of the season, Knight’s Director of Rugby Lynn Howells gave first starts to lock James Craig, No 8 Ed Jackson, fly half Tristan Roberts and centre Paul Devlin whilst prop Dan Frazier, flankers Chris Walker and Latu Makaafi, lock Matt Challinor and scrum half Nathan Roberts also made their first appearances for the Doncaster, albeit starting off the bench.

Doncaster were put under intense pressure from the off as Pirates threw everything into the attack and, after centre Matt Hopper had been denied a try after only 3 minutes, full back Rob Cook with a penalty shortly afterwards. Within minutes Pirates had extended their lead through flanker Phil Burgess’s try which was converted by Cook. Although the Knights managed to stem the one way traffic for a while, the only possession they gained was from deep in their own half and their efforts to run the ball clear were to no avail. As the game went into the second quarter, the Pirates extended their lead with two more tries, the first from close in by scrum half Gavin Cattle following an attack that had started just inside the Knight’s half and the second, 4 minutes later, when prop Alan Paver was bundled over from a lineout 5 metres from the Knight’s line. The Pirates continued to attack for the remainder of the half but the Knights’ defensive systems started to work and they managed to keep the home side out. All in all though, not a good half for the Knights that had been played almost entirely in their own half

Whatever Howells said at halftime obviously worked because the Knights were a different side in the second half. They quickly took the play to the Pirates and started to make a game of it. After 50 minutes they moved the ball to the left on their own 22 to left wing Matt Williams who, although seemingly covered, evaded the defence before racing 70 metres for a great individual try that was converted by Roberts. The Knights were now starting to fire but they were penalised on Pirates only incursion into their half and Cook kicked the goal. The Pirates fans perhaps sensed an upset as every time the ball went in the direction of Williams they seemed to go quiet. The Knights came straight back on the attack and replacement hooker Steve Lawrie and flanker Neil Cochrane came close to scoring. With 10 minutes remaining the Knights spurned a penalty in front of the posts and elected for a scrum. They attacked Pirates down the blind side and pounded away on their line for almost a minute. Replacement scrum half Jones then moved the ball quickly to the right where good passing ended with Williams, on his opposite wing, going over for his second try that Roberts again converted. With the Knights’ supporters sensing at least a bonus point their defensive problems came to the fore again as they missed a couple of tackles to allow Pirate’s fly half Johnny Bentley to jink his way over from 25 metres for his side’s bonus point try that was converted by Cook for the final score of the game and a deserved victory for the home side.

After the game Howells said that, whilst his side’s first half performance had been totally unacceptable, he said that the positives that could be taken out of the game were the scrummaging, that had been excellent throughout, and the way the side had fought back after the interval after having been seemingly “out for the count”. He said that there were clearly a number of issues that would need working on during the week but he felt that these could be remedied in time for the visit of Moseley this coming weekend. He stressed that this Knight’s side was very young, with an average age of only 24, and he said that he was confident that they would have learned much from the game which would benefit them greatly as the season wore on

Cornish Pirates: Cook, McAtee, Hopper, Winn, Jackson, Bentley, Cattle (Doherty 74), Paver, Ward (Elloway 74), Brits (Andrew 57), McGlone (Myerscough 50), Gulliver (Nimmo 74), Morgan, Marriott (Cowan 50), Burgess Sub not used: Luke

Doncaster Knights: McColl, Williams, Briers, Devlin (Wright 67), Flockhart, Roberts, Hallam (Jones 63), Thiede (Cusack 74), Boden (Lawrie 58), Cusack (Frazier 45), Kenworthy (Challinor 53), Craig, Boyde (Makaafi HT), Jackson, Cochrane (Walker 79)