Saturday 26th April 08
Gainsborough All Blacks 21 Presidents XV 27
For the second successive year the Presidents team carried off the Mick Foot memorial trophy after a quite superb game between two evenly matched sides. Austin Huntley now a Market Rasen player returned to Gainsborough to play a superb game, and earn the Dave Miles trophy for his Man of the match performance. Huntley’s tries and his all round performance was the difference between the two sides and he rightly earned his award.
Prior to the start of the game a minutes silence was observed recognising the loss of club stalwart Paul Bell in the last year and to this end it was good to see that the presidents side contained Paul's two sons both of whom made a substantial contribution to the game.
The game kicked off on a glorious sunny afternoon both teams ran the ball at every occasion, it was hard to believe that the pace could be kept up throughout all of the game but the teams made every effort. The first 20 minutes the Presidents side won the territorial battle and played most of the game in the home teams half despite the All Blacks dominating the scrums the side was not able to create territorial advantage, it was therefore no surprise that space was created for the fast fleet footed Huntley to go over for the first score of the afternoon.
Whilst I am not sure how you would put into words the full opposite of fast and fleet footed but Gainsborough’s reply was through their captain Vernon Goude who crossed the line and touched down, Shaun Parker converted and the All Blacks took the lead for the first time in the game.
On 39 minutes of the game Dave Cooper kicked through a loose ball followed it up and touched down and just as it was thought the half time whistle would go Austin Huntley went through for a fine individual try and his second of the game to make the turn round score 7 – 14 to the Presidents side.
The second half looked like the All Blacks would take the game by the scruff of its neck, but two injuries in the backs did not help the situation Elliot found himself the subject of a dead leg and had to leave the field just as Shaun Parker skipped past two defenders before he scored and converted for the home side. Shortly afterwards Howard Russell put the All Blacks in front with a try and a conversion from Shaun Parker 21 – 17. It was at this time the All Blacks lost promising youngster Jake Gray who had to leave the field with a broken wrist, this was real bad luck for Jake who as now had two injuries in the 12 games he has played for the club.
The Presidents side would not give in they spun the ball wide at every occasion scored two further tries another one from Huntley and one from veteran Albert Parker making the final score 21 -27. All that remained was for Presidents captain Paul Hooton to be presented with the Mick Foot trophy from Gary Foot at the after match celebrations. Well done to both teams an excellent afternoon’s entertainment.
