St Andrew's College overcame a false start to beat Kingswood College 42-28 in a tense KDay encounter at the City Lords grounds.
St Andrew's College overcame a false start to beat Kingswood College 42-28 in a tense KDay encounter at the City Lords grounds.
Although the visitors were first to score through a penalty kicked by fullback Brendan Owen, and ended the half with a try by winger Grant Dixie, they were outscored in the first half 18-8.
The stronger St Andrew's – who have had a good season so far, only losing five games – were undone early on by a dogged breakdown play by the hosts.
The Kingswood team intended to steal the game from the more fancied opponents by contesting on the ground.
The gimmick worked well for most of the game, and despite losing the collisions, and being dominated in the field by St Andrews, Kingswood prevented the visitors from converting their possession into points.
Enter Cameron Hertz, Kingswood’s pin-point goal kicker.
The centre scored three phenomenal penalties that, on any other day, could have been the difference between the teams.
The only problem is that on the day, the difference between the teams turned out to be more than a kicker.
Hertz’s 40 metre kick to level the scores 15 minutes into the game might have given Kingswood the self-belief, his second at 50 metres to take the lead 6-3, might have given them collective will.
The two tries the team scored after inspiration from the boot might have convinced the fans that Kingswood had built an unassailable half-time lead.
The packed stadiums roared as the home team had St Andrew's rattled 18-8 heading into the break.
Playing against the strong wind that aided their kicker, and under pressure from a rejuvenated Saints in the second half, the façade slipped, and St Andrews scored the first of their five second half tries.
Kingswood were exposed by their arch rivals for having a weaker team.
The phenomenal effort that they needed to put in to steal the match from a stronger side could not be maintained under pressure.
The second half exposed glaring deficiencies.
The Kingswood defence was porous, bunched and failed to spread to the edge of the field.
St Andrew's was thus able to break the line.
But the most telling fact that Kingswood were dominated by their inter-town rivals were their own unforced errors.
The most crucial mistakes were made by the scumhalf Davron Cameron who gifted possession to the visitors when his team were defending their line, by missing his flyhalf and passing the ball to the dead ball line.
Another revealing error was an ill-timed chip that was charged down by St Andrew's who converted the resultant loose ball to points.
As much as Kingswood battled hard and used guerrilla tactics to resisted complete dominance by St Andrew's, their cloak slipped as the game wore on, and St Andrew’s emerged from the battle victorious.
