Pirates 56 - Sedgley Park 14 YOG's View
By YOG
November 24 2008
For a side that had so many of it’s normal first team players unavailable, and with a number of key positions being filled by people coming back from long term absences, the Pirates team on Sunday played as a team with a lot of spirit and determination
Cornish
Pirates 56 - Sedgley Park 14
23rd November 2008
YOG's View Of the Match
The Pirates have been threatening a BIG win for some time now, and unfortunately for Sedgely Park, it all came together for their visit.
Whilst recent scorelines might not have hinted at the Pirates improving form (a loss to Leeds, as well as only slim wins against Esher and Moseley), the final scores have not reflected how much the Pirates have been improving in recent weeks, both in ability and spirit. However on Sunday the skill and spirit were at last justifiably matched by the final score.
Like most, I believed a five point win against Sedgley Park was not just possible, but also vital, especially considering Plymouth's five point win the day before. However I did have some reservations, not for the win itself, but whether the Pirates could do it with five points.
Like previous seasons five point wins have been a relative rarity for the team, and my confidence was not improved by the days weather.
The day consisted of heavy showers, sometimes increasing to driving rain, and at other times driving hail, coupled with a finger numbing coldness. In short, not ideal weather for fast or controlled ball handling. And that was just the environmental difficulties. Added to this would be the RFU's stated preference of relegating the bottom five teams at the conclusion of this season's National One league.
Whilst Sedgely Park aren't exactly propping up the bottom of the table, they are within the RFU's drop zone, so it could be expected that they would be coming out with the attitude that they were playing with their Div-1 future at stake.
If this wasn't enough to make the result uncertain, the Pirates would be playing with a number of first choice players either unavailable because of international duty, injured/ill, or being rested because of niggles. There would be no Rhys Jones, Adryan Winnan, Rhodri McAtee, Nicky Griffith, Ed Fairhurst, Brucy, Rob, Mike, Scott, Joe …..
A win ? …….. Definitely……… A five point win ? …. Possibly.
Continued on Press Gang Website >>>
"they should be told not to play home games on Sundays, we have to travel to the far tip of England and the boys have to be at work on Monday morning"...
" Me and my chairman only just fit into our office, but it's bigger than their away changing room"...
"this is the one away trip I do not look forward to"...
Were they beaten before they left , do you think?
If you want to be in this league get used to it, Mr Fourie. Anyway, you won't have to deal with it next season.
He does however have a point with reagrds to the away changing rooms (Although they are only slightly better than the home changing rooms). If the club ar going to continue playing at Camborne (Which I hope they do) they should look at addressing the situation, which wouldn't be too difficult. I was looking at the back of the stand yesterday and it is apparent that in effect Camborne ran out of money to complete the stand, if you look where the CRFC table sells drinks and chocolates, you will see a wall in the end of the stand with a door and window opening, then look to where the away changing rooms are and you will see the wall was just built across on the angle.
I reckon it would only cost about £10k to complete, less if a few of us are willing to throw our hands to it, it may even be possible then to provide a proper physio room.
Poor dears will just have to rough it.
If you're going through hell...keep going
Stalwart I know what you're saying, but there are ways around it, 10k is not a small amount I agree, but we're a club with a turnover probably coming on for a couple of million pounds.
The costs are all labour and basic materials - concrete, blocks, timber etc, nothing fancy. The labour element can be mitigated if we could form a small band of able volunteers, the club could otentially get around the material costs by effectively paying for materials with hospitality packages builders merchants and the likes regularly offer construction companies corporate tickets to pirates games.
Of course I wouldn't suggest we give the away teams a nice new changing room, our lads could have the new extended changing room and the away team our old room with a little bit of a new paint job.
Its just an idea as th changing rooms are rather poor.
I'm sure, as you say, that there would be plenty of willing hands. The players could hump some blocks around and push a few barrows of cement!
I suppose the question is whether we're going to be at Camborne for a few more years. If so, then let's do it!
When we first moved to Camborne a group of us piled in to do painting etc, and a lot was done last summer, too; and I was only thinking on Sunday that some little git had covered our nice white paint at the main pay box with graffiti and we need to go up there and do it again.
We took control of the game right from the start,even playing into the elements and it continued throughout the full 80 mins,with only one lapse of concentration,when we gifted them their 2nd try.
Good to see a number of guys getting onto the field and getting some game time and great to see Simon Whatling and Jimmy Moore back out on the field and showing why they are both quality players.
With regard to the Camborne ground,i guess IF we are to be part of any new GP 2 and staying at Camborne(which I hope we do) then there is a need to upgrade the facilities again and maybe a close season of improvements need to be planned,using some volunteers as required.