Match Report

 Eastern R 26-32 Southend

03/06/06 (Courtesy of Southend Seaxes)

On Saturday Southend Seaxes RLFC played their second game of the season when they travelled to Colchester to face the Eastern Raiders. The view of many was that the Seaxes were going to lose as they are a new setup with very little experience or training but they came out storming with Jerry East picking up on gaps in the Raiders defence and using some great footwork to score within the first five minutes of the game. He then set up Luke Bredin for a 50 metre sprint with only the Raiders winger and covering full back to beat soon after with another score.

 

The Seaxes then went on the back foot for ten minutes giving away a couple of silly penalties due to a lack of knowledge of the game and had to defend four back to back sets. This period produced some excellent defence from the Seaxes and at one point when the Raiders pulled off a great move to break the Seaxes defensive line, the Seaxes scrambled very well to keep the Raiders out and eventually regained possession. After regaining possession the traffic became one way in the Seaxes favour, with tries coming from Martin Bunyan picking out gaps in the Raiders defence and going in under the sticks, Paul Knight with an awesome pick up from a Raiders spill then racing 80 meters to score, and Sean Thompson being put into a gap with a lovely pass from the five-eighth and having a 60 metre race to the line going under the sticks.

 

With not long left on the clock for the first half the Seaxes made a silly mistake in defence and the Raiders picked up on the gaps left and scored a great try by breaking the last tackle on the line.  The Seaxes replied almost instantly with Luke Bredin crashing over the line from ten meters out through three Raiders Defenders to bag his second score of the game.

 

The second half saw a big change in roles as the hot day and lack of substitutes for the Seaxes started to take its toll.  The Raiders were attacking the Seaxes defence with much more enthusiasm and with more penalties being given away by the Seaxes, meant the Raiders started the Great Comeback. The Raiders started to leave the Seaxes defence for dead scoring a couple of tries but with another great dinking run from Jerry East resulting in his second try of the game there was renewed hope amongst the visitors.  With twenty minutes left and the Raiders within twelve points of the Seaxes they really started to wear the opposition down and put the pressure on by scoring again with ten minutes left.  This score was converted, putting the Raiders six points behind with a good chance of pipping the Seaxes in the dying minutes of the game. However, the Seaxes showed amazing “never say die” defence for the last ten minutes with everyone on the pitch putting the biggest hits in and putting their bodies on the line to hold out for a 32-26 win.