ST ALBERT’S COLLEGE secured their place in this year’s New England Rugby Union grand final with an emphatic victory over the Armidale Blues.
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The minor premiers were fast out of the blocks and earned their first five-pointer when a flying Dan Sweeney crossed in the corner.
It wasn’t long before country representative Charlie French pushed his way through the line to score next to the posts.
The conversion was successful pushing Albies out to a 12-0 lead.
The students continued to dominate, extending their lead to 19-0 with a converted try courtesy of Matt Nott in the corner before the Blues hit back with Dave Healey crossing in the corner.
Dan Sweeney earned his second through some slick ball movement right on the half-time break which extended the hosts’ lead 26 points to five.
The second half saw a much tighter contest with just one try scored through Albies’ Matt Nott with less than 10 minutes to go to bring the final scoreline to 31-5.
Ablies’ co-coaches Tom Newsome and Chris Kelly were thrilled with their team’s performance and were particularly impressed by the dominance of the forward pack in laying a platform for the side’s outside backs.
““We are really happy with the guys,” Newsome said.
“The scrums were awesome in that first half and the backs ran off that.
“The dominance of the forwards and their defence in the second half was really good when Armidale were trying to come back into the game.
Kelly said the second half was tougher for his team but was proud of how his side manage to hold out the Blues’ quick men.
“They only time Armidale looked really dangerous is when we made mistakes to give them good field position,” he said.
“Other than that, their defence has been sensational.
The Blues have another opportunity to land a place in the grand final when they take on the winner of Sunday’s match between Barbarians and Robb College in next weekend’s preliminary final.
The defending premiers struggled to hold onto the ball against St Albert’s and coach Luke Stephen said his side didn’t handle being under constant pressure well enough to stay in the game.
“The second half we were a lot stronger once we were able to maintain some possession but Albies, to their credit were able to disrupt our ball early and really make us play unsettled rugby,” he said.
“We talk a lot about playing to our strengths and on Saturday, we were nowhere near that.”