12/11/11
After a week of heavy rain which stopped on Friday evening when a drying breeze sprung up from the West it was no surprise that Saturday’s home game to Tonna was played on a heavy and strength sapping surface.
Despite losing Dan twin, James Lewis and Mark Jones, three stalwarts this season, through injuries from last week’s adventure in the Swalec Bowl we actually gathered together 20 players for selection before kick off.
The team was: Richard Smith (Captain) Dwayne Dudley, Rhydian Williams, Nathan Billy Davies, Richard Williams, Mike Lovett, David Williams, Jon Smith, Shaun Simons, David Price, Aled Edwards, Luke Williams, Lloyd Bryant, Adrian Lewis and Dickie Davies and on the bench Ryan Williams, Leeroy Morgan, Greg Morris, Simon Grindle and Steve Davies.
Tonna had secured a run of good results this season with recent wins over Porthcawl and Ogmore Vale and a very creditable draw with Cefn Cribbwr so we were anticipating a nail biter.
Unusually but importantly, Rhigos played well right from kick off with several strong runs from Luke Williams and Dave Williams breaking the Tonna line before we forced a penalty that Dave Price converted for 3 points. Within minutes we were 8 points up when strong running again broke the defence and Tonna were forced to concede a throw in from 5 yards. Mike Lovett leaped like a salmon and flipped the ball to Jon Smith sweeping around the front for a well worked score that we had never done before.
Tonna’s backs threatened with some dangerous running and close passing and were unlucky when first Mike Lovett put in an excellent tackle on the line and then their left wing chasing hard just failed to ground a difficult bouncing grubber kick just before it went dead. Woken up by this burst of pressure from Tonna and after squandering some good approach work on a number of occasions Rhigos finally clicked and backrow and three quarters combined well for Luke Williams to send Aled Eggy on a surge down the wing. He ran outside the full back and sprinted around under the posts for a really fine try that Dave Price converted for a 15 point lead at Half time.
After half time the Rhigos pack upped their work rate and dominated the scrum, lineout and breakdown with a super show of power that saw Tonna penned back in their 22 metre zone for practically the wholeof the 40 minutes. A series of excellent controlled driving mauls saw first Richard Williams and then Jon Smith score fine tries but really any one of the eight forwards could have been on the score sheet. In the final minutes with the bonus point already secured Jon Smith picked up and scored from a five metre scrum wide out and Luke Williams converted majestically to round off the scoring. It was Jon Smith’s hat trick try and it rounded off an excellent performance by him strong in defence and forceful in attack.
We were also delighted to see the return of David Twin after his nasty eye injury pre season, and Greg Morris who seems to have recovered well from snapped Achilles tendon the season before last. Next week is a tough one away to Cefn Cribbwr and who knows we might have more than 15 players on the bus.
What great preparation the game was for Dai Morris 70th birthday party later that Saturday evening. It was marvelous to see so many former Rhigos, Glynneath and Neath boys at the club celebrating with one of the truly great Welsh players of all time.