Hartbury in red and Park in navy

Practice match

The difference between full-time Championship Rugby and Park’s normal beat in National 1 was stamped through this match. Park found it difficult to cope with the speed of the home side’s attacks and found themselves three tries in arrears – one of them a penalty try – at 21-0 after only 10 minutes.

Park looked good in possession against a well-drilled defence and got a try back when the forwards drove over out wide for Adam Frampton to score.



However Hartpury came back at them with their speedy backs adding two further tries.

Park had the last say before the interval with Harry Leonard and Jacob Atkins combining well on the right to score and convert for 33-12 at the break.

The visitors were rarely in the match as an attacking force in the second half, giving an outing to everyone in the 27-man squad and Hartpury added five further tries without reply to win by 66-12.

Park’s performance was not anything like as bad as the final score might suggest, but Hartpury’s speed and efficiency were – quite literally – in another league.

Park Head Coach Kieran Power said, “We knew this was our biggest challenge of preseason and with Hartpury starting the game at a breathtaking pace we were down by 4 tries before the half hour mark.

“We took time to adjust to the pace and physicality of the game and then for facets of it we acquitted ourselves well but ultimately the speed of the game took its toll.

“We need to learn our lessons quickly and try too put in a performance this Friday night that we can be buoyant about going into the league season”.
Park: Robinson; Crane, Henderson, Barnes, Marfo; Leonard; Weir; Nwakor, Gibson, Gratton; Spivey, Boyle; Frampton, Thomas, Taggart.
Bench: Bellamy, Wade, Spencer, Brand, Atkins, Dudman-Jones, Higgins, Hudson, Gray, Crow, Smith, Williams, Hutson, Vaughan-Edwards

Rosslyn Park complete their pre-season matches this Friday with a home match against London Irish Wild Geese, kicking off at 7:45PM. Admission is free.

Charlie Addiman

Images: David E Whittam

August 21, 2017