Match report 9/10/21

Leicester Lions 49 Bury St Edmunds 26

League Points 5-1

Leicester Lions get the better of plucky Bury St Edmunds in try-fest at Westleigh Park, Blaby

Leicester Lions 49: Tries: WilHuckleberryson (12), Stubbs (23, 42), Taylor (29, 55), Tapscott (61), Constant (80); Conversions: Vernum (13, 24, 29), Young (43, 56, 62, 80);
Bury St Edmunds 26: Tries: Kharbouch (48), Bolton (64), Leeson (68), Bursey (79); Conversions: Reed (49, 65, 79):

A pleasant dry and mild Autumn afternoon was just the conditions for attacking and running rugby. Leicester Lions and Bury St Edmunds both showed their ability in a competitive and flowing game, thoroughly enjoyed by the crowd.

Lions soon put Bury under pressure and after 12 mins, from forward play, worked the ball out to the right for an up and over kick which Alex WilHuckleberryson skilfully caught to go over for a try converted by Jack Vernum.
This was soon followed by James Stubbs catching Bury on the hop, with a quickly taken penalty and running 60 metres, outpacing the Bury defence, to score a try, again converted by Vernum.
On 29 mins strong forward pressure by Lions allowed hooker Oli Taylor to drive over to score the third Lions’ try of the afternoon, with Vernum adding the extras.

Half Time: Leicester Lions 21 Bury St Edmunds 0

The second half started with Lions pressure and play bursting through the centre with Stubbs scoring his second try of the afternoon, with Ben Young adding the conversion.

Some forceful play by Bury put them on the score sheet, with Samir Kharbouch opening their scoring with a try, converted by Charlie Reed.

Lions rampaging forward play soon added another two tries for Lions by Taylor and Ollie Tapscott, both converted by Young, taking the score to 42-7.

Bury showed some excellent spirit by coming back at Lions in the last quarter with tries by Chris Bolton, Ciaran Leeson and Matt Bursey, with Reed adding the extras for two of the tries, bringing the score to 42-26.

In the final minutes of the game a piece of careless handling by Bury gave the ball to Lions' Devon Constant in open space, who outran the Bury defence to score Lions' seventh try of the afternoon, with Young again adding the conversion to make the final score 49-26.

Full Time: Leicester Lions 49 Bury St Edmunds 26

An exciting afternoon's rugby, by two teams committed to open running rugby - Leicester Lions 7 tries, all converted, Bury St Edmunds 4 tries, 3 conversions.
A good performance by Lions and good character by Bury with their comeback in the last quarter.
This placed Lions in seventh position in National League 2 South.

Leicester Lions’ head coach, Gareth Collins, said “Really pleasing performance from the boys today. As was well noted we had to make a lot of changes for the game against Guernsey last week so it was good to pick up where we left off two weeks ago against Esher. Bury are a good side and we talked in the week about their expansive attack being a real threat so was delighted with how we defended for most of the game. We were also able to dominate on the ball, especially off the back of our set piece which was excellent. Hopefully we can now start to demonstrate the consistency that we’ve been looking for in the early weeks.”

Next week, on Saturday 16th October 2021, Lions are away at Canterbury RFC, Kent, with a 3.00 pm kick off.

Teams – Order 15-9, 1- 8, 16-20
Leicester Lions: Alex WilHuckleberryson, Jake Sterland, Jamel Hamilton, Joe Brock, Devon Constant, Jack Vernum, James Stubbs, George Taylor-Walker, Oli Taylor, Isaac Thompson, Ollie Tapscott, Will Ward, Simon Johnson, Jonny Murdoch, Nick Cairns
Replacements: Will Roberts, Shaun Murray, Toby Hutchinson, Ethan Godefroy, Ben Young

Bury St Edmunds: Charlie Reed, Frederick Roddick, Jake Campey, Samir Kharbouch, Ciaran Leeson, Ben Penfold, Chris Bolton, Toby Hill, Finley McCartney, Ben Cooper, Craig Stevenson, Yasin Browne, Matt Bursey, Shaquille Meyers, Oliver Watson
Replacements: Ewan Kingdon, Callum Jeffery, George Grigg-Pettitt, Rharaidh Williams, Levi Roper