Following the recent deluges Shevington Sharks travelled the by now familiar road to Harper Street to play a hastily reversed fixture against Wigan St Patrick's.

On a glorious Sunday morning Shevington arrived to find a number of new (and bigger) players taking the field against them in this eagerly anticipated encounter. During the warm up the side was strongly reminded to show our opponents the respect they deserve and to play unselfishly as a team.

"Being a part of success is more important than being personally indispensable."

Shevington kicked off and a high bounce found touch on the left. From the resultant scrum Shevington used a couple of drives to pull defenders in, and then moved the ball along the line to Coaches award winner James Duffy on the wing who scored out wide. Spectator’s award winner Conor Sheehan Jones just missed the conversion.

The Sharks drove the ball back down the middle, and a clever chip though from Conor bounced nicely for the Sharks powerhouse captain Phillip Bretherton to take the ball and score. Conor Sheehan Jones converted.

Shevington then applied some strong pressure and were unfortunate to miss out on three more opportunities before Oliver Roby ran the ball in to score the Sharks third try. Conor converted.

With James Molyneux already missing on his holidays, Shevington then lost their influential scrum half Jake Connell. This change resulted in full back Brandon Earlam moving to scrum half and prop Robert Dandy to full back.

Shevington then gave two silly penalties away giving St Pats an attacking position near the line, and some lazy defence allowed their “go to guy” Sam to force his way over.

There was a comment made by a spectator, when the side were being reminded that this was a preventable try. I have to confess that when we are playing I do not go out of my way to nil sides and will often make life more difficult for us by resting and switching players. I certainly don’t expect every player to make every single tackle in a game. I do aspire to give our players the motivation and drive to set themselves these targets and to give them the desire to push them-selves to achieve them.

"Giving yourself permission to lose is the best way to guarantee a loss."

A great example of this was James Duffy. Today he gave an exemplary display of how to tackle an opponent, it didn’t matter if they were big or small, fast or slow, a lot of players targeted Duffy’s wing, and every single one of them ended up on the floor. The challenge of defending out wide was also taken up by the other wingers (Jack Heywood, Jack Brogan and Liam Fowler) with not one missed tackle amongst the four of them.

Conor Sheehan Jones scored Shevington’s final try of the half which he duly converted from the touchline.

Half time St Pats 4-26 Shevington Sharks

The second half followed a similar pattern to the first with Shevington limiting the St Pats side to very few opportunities to threaten the Sharks line. Shevington’s very own Pat (Patrick “Patch” McCarroll) started the half with one of the best breaks of the day running the ball 40M up the field to set up good field position. Shevington's first try of the second half was Pip’s second of the game following a strong run through the middle of the field. The second try came following a strong run from man of the match Connor Rothwell, which was backed up by a short scoot, and then Connor Rothwell put himself in at first receiver to pick up the ball again to power through the line to score. Both of these tries were converted by Conor Sheehan Jones.

Following all of the good passing moves and support play it would be fair to say that Shevington’s next try was not out of the text book. With Conor Sheehan Jones having successfully put boot to ball whenever he saw the opportunity and space to attack, and having trapped St Pats in goal earlier in the game, Conor decided to try his luck with a kick through on the second tackle which he followed up with a fly kick which he somehow overran. Ever dependable loose forward Josh Caldwell was backing up and somehow managed to dribble the ball over the line to score. As they were playing what they could see at the time and this move worked for them then I have to bite my lip this time. Conor converted the try.

With Jake insisting he could play for the last few minutes, he came back on to give Conor a well-deserved rest. The Shark’s final try of the day started on the left when Phillip Bretherton used his monster hand off to make a break and from the subsequent play the ball Liam Fowler kept the impetus going with one of his usual darting scoots. With everyone shouting for him to hold onto the ball he duly offloaded and the ball was then quickly moved 30M along the line to finish in the hands of Oliver Roby in plenty of space and only a few yards from the line, Oliver then unselfishly passed to Jake who scored (further from the posts). Fortunately Dmya Hanley had borrowed Conor’s kicking boots and he duly converted, giving the Sharks an impressive 8 out of 9 conversions on the day.

The final score was Wigan St Patricks Cougars 4-52 Shevington Sharks.
What pleased me most today was the way the side played as a team and followed the game plan, even though we had made a lot of changes and we had players switching around and filling several different positions and roles today.

“There are no great rugby players. Only great challenges which ordinary rugby players, out of necessity, are forced to meet. The best rugby players are simply those who are willing to face these challenges most often.”

Today’s result was built around a strong defensive performance with Robert Dandy, Patrick McCarroll, Josh Caldwell and George Bridge all putting in strong performances while Josh Tabernar and Tom Grey were both putting some strong hits in today. There were some good kick-off catches from Jack Brogan and Jack Heywood while in attack the stalwarts of Conor Sheehan Jones, Dmya Hanley, and Phillip Bretherton were joined by Oliver Roby who had another great game. However it was those children who filled different roles who deserve our thanks. Brandon, Josh Caldwell and Conor all distributed the ball well. Robert Dandy and James Duffy were both faultless when covering at fullback, while centre Connor Rothwell carried on where Pip left off when he filled in at prop forward.

St Patrick's Cougars 4 shevington Sharks 52

Today's Try Scorers:
James Duffy, Phillip Bretherton (2), Connor rothwell (2), Oliver Roby, Conor Sheehan-Jones, Josh Caldwell and Jake Connell
Conversions:
Conor Sheehan-Jones (7) and Dmya Hanley
Today's awards:
connor rothwell, Conor Sheehan-Jones and James Duffy