Doncaster Rugby Club

This week Doncaster Phoenix finally played a fixture which was meant to have been played nearer to Christmas but was cancelled twice for bad weather. After a rather disappointing outing last week at West Leeds we had to put in a good performance to make sure we were on good form and at our peak for when we go to Twickenham.

Changes this week included, Atkinson back in at hooker, Bray came into the 2^nd row instead of the leaping Wilkinson and Thomas returned in the centre.

The game started with some good pressure by Roundhegians with there No 8 often picking from the base of the scrum and making good yards. Roundhegians came close to scoring a couple of times and was even held up over the line at one point after a good rolling maul. But Phoenix weathered the storm and from our first real attack we scored. A brilliantly ran backs move put Burton through who drew the full back and passed to the supporting Morris who got to the try line. He then decided to pass the ball to Carey Thomas to get the score. No idea why! Miller ably converted.

Phoenix with a bit of momentum scored soon after, the forwards had made some good ground down the left and Elliot cut through the retreating defence then offloaded out of the tackle to Jazz at speed. A well constructed try but extremely we’ll finished by Jazz.

The rest of the half was spent around the halfway line with both sides having bits of possession before losing the ball, by either poor rucking, handling or some weird refereeing decisions. Half time 14-0 to Phoenix.

At the beginning of the second half, Roundhegians put some pressure on Phoenix and after a 10 minute period of good defence Roundhegians managed to spin it wide for there winger to score in the corner. 14-5 and Phoenix were looking a little edgy. They did manage to settle their nerves with a Miller penalty, but Roundhegians came straight back and scored another try almost an exact replica for their first. This made the scores 17-10.

Phoenix composed themselves and managed to get back on top with some good rugby, Burton and Jazz both coming close before their hands let them down. Burton will blame Elliot of course. A try did eventually come courtesy of Morris who pick from a scrum about 15 yards out and managed to hold off the fullback long enough to reach the line. The conversion was missed. From the kick off Phoenix came straight back, a poor clearance by Roundhegians gave Jazz time to break and off load to Burton who managed to round the full back for a try. 29-10 Game over.

In summary, Phoenix played well in spells, a good ten minutes here and there was enough to win the game but it is nowhere near where we want to be. On personal notes for me, Burton played well when the ball stuck to his hands, Thomas defended well in the middle and Elliot (Snr) looked very sharp. It was also very pleasing to see Al Kaihau back in the first team after a long spell out. Job done but could be better.