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Scotland U17 v England U17 - Richard Mathieson (Senior) Reports

Scotland U17 v England U17 - Richard Mathieson (Senior) Reports

Dom Benson4 Apr 2012 - 09:07
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Louis Clayton-Malloy and Richard Mathieson from Wasps U17 both played for England U17 against Scotland at Melrose on Sunday 25 March 2012.

England won the game on a glorious sunny day in the Borders and both Louis and Richard played a half at full back.

Scotland started brightly with an early penalty to put them ahead and the home crowd was in good voice fresh from “Flower of Scotland”. Both packs were fairly evenly matched in the early exchanges and at the set pieces Scotland had the upper hand in the scrums whilst England had the better of the lineout.

The difference in the first half came with the England backs who moved the ball quickly and with some noticeably classy play by the centres. Scotland kicked possession back to England on a number of occasions and, with perfect conditions for running rugby, England could counter attack from poor kicks. It was from one of these counter attacks that Louis was able to score one of England’s tries: cutting back towards the Scottish forwards he chipped over the advancing wall of defenders, gathered the bouncing ball and scored in the corner. The first half was definitely characterized by England’s running rugby, particularly when Scotland were a man down with their No 7 in the bin for charging a ruck.

The second half saw a new front row from England and this evened up the scrums and England continued to have the better of the line out. However England lost their fly half to the bin for a tackle offence. Despite England being a man down in the backs, and now facing directly into the sun, Scotland elected to pick and drive through the forwards rather than using their numerical superiority in the backs or using kicks out of the sun to exploit England’s stretched defence. Scotland were however able to draw the scores closer with a couple of tries. England did score again when they were back to full strength: a line of passing from a ruck, close to Scotland’s line, included a fast take-and-give by Richard in front of the last defender to put the winger into the corner for a try.

Final score 33 - 15 to England

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