Northwood Hold Kearsney to a Draw
It’s early march but already schools are playing rugby. This match between Kearsney College of Botha’s Hill outside Durban and Northwood High of Durban North was played at beautiful Kearsney.
The report is from Kearsney:
Northwood started with high intensity and after 20 minutes managed a 12-nil lead. The visitors used their bulky forwards to attack the defensive line and twice managed to score – first in the right-hand corner for a unconverted try and the second after a classy offload from their impressive flyhalf for a seven pointer.
The hosts looked stunned but all credit for an impressive fight-back to end the half on 12-all. The first try came from centre Luke Dudley who dived around the ruck fringes after strong carries from captain Massimo Fierro. Luke du Toit converted and Kearsney soon followed this up with another try from prop Cameron van Eck, after a lineout maul.
Kearsney came out very determined and were somewhat unlucky not to convert opportunities in the first 10 minutes of the second half. Northwood scored next, somewhat against the run of play after a series of unforced errors by the hosts. Shortly after Kearsney answered with a well-worked try by full back Trent Coetzee, after some good territorial play from flyhalf Matthew Hind and strong carry by centre Connor De Bruyn.
The hosts struck again within two minutes, with a possible try of the match, when De Bruyn produced a good offload to winger Aya Mngaza who outsprinted the opposition for a good 50 meters, to score under the posts for Du Toit to convert.
The final Northwood try came from a charge down on the scrum half’s clearance kick which was converted and a tied score of 24-all. The hosts can be disappointed in that they squandered opportunities through bad skill. However, both teams played decent rugby enjoyed by the crowd.
Outstanding players for the hosts were Fierro, De Bruyn, flanker Derick Marshall and winger Mngaza.
From Sue Miles
Photo: Tracey van den Aardweg
