WRU National Bowl Quarter-Final - Monmouth RFC 10 Abercwmboi 21

MONMOUTH RFC First XV hosted Abercwmboi RFC on Saturday 24th March, in the biggest game of the season so far, the quarter final of the Welsh Rugby Union Bowl competition.

Both sides were able to call upon extremely vocal support and it may be down to this, a lack of game time or big match nerves, but the opening exchanges were littered with uncharacteristic mistakes from both sides. The players soon settled into a rhythm and the watching crowd were treated to some excellent cut and thrust rugby, with both sides turning defence into attack and showing their willingness to play rugby.

The frenetic pace and lack of rugby in recent weeks soon took its toll with both sides giving away silly penalties, from one infringement Monmouth had the opportunity to open the scoring but the ball drifted agonisingly wide of the posts from the resulting penalty kick. Monmouth were soon on the receiving end of the referee’s wrath, when after a quickly taken penalty by the Abercwmboi scrum half, Monmouth number eight Tom Hawkins was judged to have made a tackle within 10 meters of the penalty and received 10 minutes in the sin bin.

Abercwmboi took full advantage of the extra man and from a lineout deep in the Monmouth half their outside half stepped his way through the defensive line opening the scoring with a converted try under the post to give the visitors a seven-point lead.

The seven-point cushion did not last long and the home team soon had the chance to cut the deficit with a penalty kick at goal which this time sailed through the posts, giving a half time score of Monmouth 3 Abercwmboi 7.

The second half started in the same ferocious manner as the first, and the referee was soon to be back in the thick of the action, issuing a yellow card to the visitors outside half, giving Monmouth the extra man advantage.

This stirred the home side into life, after a period of sustained pressure led by the outstanding front row of Szwagrzak, Bartlett and Ridgeway the team were suddenly on the front foot to make a break through the middle. Excellent inter passing saw Scott Giles feed centre Daffydd Hellard who crashed over for the score which was converted to give Monmouth a 10-7 lead.

Abercwmboi soon retaliated, with a decisive break from their centre and fantastic support work from the number eight, resulting in a well-deserved try which was again converted giving visitors a 14-10 lead.

With the clock ticking away Monmouth had to start chasing the game, this created errors which Abercwmboi capitalised on. It was from one of these errors Monmouth found themselves defending a lineout on their own try line. After a number of charges by the opposition forwards the Monmouth defence buckled resulting in the visitors scoring their third and decisive try which was converted by the number 12 who had a great game with the boot, from right out on the touch line, clinching a victory by 21-10 and progression to the semi-final.

Photos courtesy of Gareth Roberts