St Jacques claim their own line-out ball at St Peter against Jersey Seconds. (Picture by Tony Pike, 0665712)
ST JACQUES’ season went from bad to worse as they suffered a crushing 81-3 defeat at the hands of Jersey Seconds at the weekend.
The Sarnian side find themselves stuck to the bottom of the JRA League table having not won a game yet this campaign.
And their woes continued when they travelled to Jersey on Sunday to take on the strongest team in the league, who are effectively the old Jersey first XV before they brought in professional players coupled with some very promising youngsters.
‘The final scoreline was not a pleasant one to consider at 81-3, but other sides have fallen foul of comparable scorelines this season, including Guernsey Seconds and Banks, who both suffered heavily at the hands of a Jersey second team fighting for their first team places,’ said St Jacques coach Chris Griffiths.
‘The gulf between Jersey seconds and the other sides in the JRA League has been growing bigger and bigger over the last few seasons and it is now apparent that they really are a league or two above in terms of quality and strength.’
St Jacques kicked off the match and immediately the Jersey back row set their stall out by running straight back through the blacks’ pack with real pace and menace, but a knock on allowed the first scrum from which the visitors kicked for field position.
After a few phases the game stretched across to the opposite side of the pitch where a penalty was awarded to St Jacques.
Stand-in captain Tom Chamberlain converted a great kick from out on the touchline and put his side 3-0 up after the first 10 minutes.
However, after this early promise, the wheels began to fall off for Saints as the pace and power of the Jersey team began to tell as they broke through tackle after tackle.
By half time the Jersey team were 31-3 up.
The second half did not get any easier for the Sarnians and although there were moments of good attacking play from them, the strength of the opposition was simply too much to contain.
Griffiths was determined to look on the positives from the match.
‘We were not too disheartened by this result as we performed well in certain areas which was encouraging and we will work on those areas we didn’t perform so well in,’ he said.
‘Importantly we didn’t pick up any injuries with lots of rugby still to be played over the next couple of months. After a tough first three league games, we will now look to win our next three before Christmas and try and claw back a poor start to our season so far.’
The island’s other side in the league, Guernsey Seconds, were also in action on Sunday.
They had a more fruitful day as they got the better of Banks 27-7 at the Guernsey Rugby Club.
Their tries came courtesy of Barry Goude, Seoirse Lee, Layton Batiste and compact centre Stuart Bisson with his first ever try.
Vice-captain Carl Gardner scored one conversion and one penalty.
‘It was a brilliant team performance,’ said Gardner.
‘They are a good team and we normally struggle against them. I reckon it’s been about three years since we last beat them.
‘Ray Smart [Guernsey captain] said he was really impressed but he couldn’t say too much because we’d all played so well.’JRA League: St Jacques beaten but Guernsey win
Article posted on 5th November, 2008 - 2.29pm
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