Cobham U21 beat Guildford

This season, Cobham have made a firm commitment to compete in the Surrey U21 competition. This competition involves 24 clubs, and we find ourselves in an initial pool of three team with Guildford and Effingham & Leatherhead.

Fixtures are earmarked to be played over the school / university holiday periods, thus encouraging returning students to play for their home clubs.

Our opening fixture against Guildford was always going to be a challenge. We understood the Guildford side to consist primarily of their very successful U19 squad. The Cobham side was made up from a fairly even split of players across the U21, U20 and U19 age groups’ plus a representation of Gareth Powlson from the National Champions winning U17 team. On paper we were strong, although possibly lacking an element of cohesion and match fitness. Under the guidance of the coaching team Bill Davison, Robbie Kennard and Dave Silver and the captaincy of Alex Crane we prepared and were ready to get the competition underway.

Cobham kicked off and from the start made strong inroads into the Guildford half. It was evident early on that the Cobham lineout play of Crane and Goddard would be dominant, being found with ease from the throwing in by Bass. Likewise in the scrum Cobham seemed to have the edge, with a front row all of which played senior 1st or 2nd XV rugby last season, despite the reluctance of Cairns playing in the unfamiliar role of tight head. In the backs we looked sharp and eventually from a scrum, and quick hands through the three quarters, Sam Yates went over in the corner to score Cobham’s first try, which was unconverted.

Overall Cobham looked the more composed and structured team with further scores in this half failing to come due to marginal errors and a very determined Guildford defence. For the final 10 minutes of this half, Guildford finish strongly, with Cobham being at the wrong end of a number of penalty decisions, and they were unlucky not to score, held out by some resolute Cobham tackling and superb work rate from the back row of Brown, Rowson and Li. The first half concluded with Cobham 5-0 up, although feeling that perhaps it should have been more.

With several changes made at half time, the 2nd half started with almost an immediate penalty awarded to Guildford which they kicked to get their first points on the board. Cobham did not panic and within five minutes created another try scoring opportunity, started by Fullback Charlie Rooke  who took yet another superb high ball and started a high intensity counter attack which culminated in fly half Tim Forster going over under the posts, which he duly converted. Guildford continued with their tenacious defence and held Cobham up on the line. From the resulting scrum, Forster again found the gap and went in unopposed under the posts and converted.

Cobham made further changes throughout the 2nd half, making full use of the 24 man squad that had been assembled, and despite Guildford match them for numbers, the Cobham strength in depth was now evident as the game seemingly remained camped in the Guildford half. Cobham’s 4th try came through fantastic interaction between forwards and backs, resulting in Sam Yates crossing over for his second of the match, and again converted by Forster.

Continued domination in the tight combined with attacking flair, Oli Scott went over in the corner for Cobham’s fifth whilst the sixth and final try came via the very impressive Charlie Mortimor. The final whistle blew with Cobham coming away victorious winning 36-3, pleasing all players, coaches and the band of loyal Cobham supporters.

Overall this was a superb squad performance, and the fact that we were able to utilise all 24 players, with significant number of others unavailable clearly shows the potential this squad has for the competition this season and for further years to come.

The Cobham U21 squad is an essential platform for integrating youth players into the senior set-up and many of the players fielded have had significant senior experience already. We are already looking forward to assembling the squad for our next pool match against Effingham at Home over the Christmas period, and we wish Guildford all the best for their remaining matches.

Scorers

Sam Yates  2  Tries

Oli Scott 1 Try

Charlie Mortimer 1 Try

Tom Forster 2 Tries 3 Conversions

Cobham Squad

1 Aeren Young

2 Karl Bass

3 Harry “The Bag” Cairns

4 Joe Goddard

5 Alex Crane (Captain)

6 Josh Brown

7 Max Rowson

8 Josh Li

9 Patrick Disley-May

10 Tom Forster                                       

11 Jake Joyce

12 Gareth Powlson

13 Callum Williams

14 Sam Yates                                           

15 Charlie Rooke

Bench

16 Dyl Salamon

17 Piers Pavey

18 Alex Humber

19 Chris Blacketer

20 Stuart Riddler

21 Oli Scott                                               

22 Charlie Mortimer                             

23 Jack Spencer

24 Ed Perrson

Match Report by Churchill