Irish Canadian Rugby Club 59 - Peterborough Pagans 0
30/04/05
Friendly

The Irish Women continued their pre-season matches with a match-up against the Peterborough Pagans last Saturday.  Coming off a sub par performance last weekend, the Irish Women found themselves faced with a similar challenge as they were facing one of the young and upcoming teams in the province and still had to contend with the less than ideal field and weather conditions.  Unlike the previous week, the Irish Women choose the proper tactics and easily dealt with a pesky opponent and came away with an 11 try effort and a 59–0 victory to keep them unbeaten during the pre-season.

Despite the cold, wet and muddy conditions the Irish Women put on an impressive display of forward work as the large pack dominated the ruck and maul throughout the game and denied Peterborough possession for the entire 80 minutes.  Barb Lamb was dangerous with the ball in hand while Christine Ford and Meagan Haney were around the ball all afternoon long.  The backline looked dangerous despite the slippery footing as Jess Panzer and Kylie James in the mid-field exposed the Pagans defense with some scything runs and slick passing.  Fist half trys were scored by Debbie Brenneman, Jess Panzer (2), Barb Lamb, and Christine Ford.  Halftime score was 27–0.

The second half showed much more of the same as the dominating forward play allowed the backline to move the ball into open space throughout the field.  Brenneman completed the hat trick with 2 more trys, Karen Lozada, Meagan Haney, Danielle Dillon all touched down in the second half.  Jane Segal capped off a fine performance with a try and 2 conversions to finish the scoring at 59–0.

“Obviously a much better performance than last week.  I was really encouraged that the players responded positively to a tough week of training and correcting the mistakes we made last week” commented Coach Rodin “Koko” Lozada.  “We aren’t quite there yet, but with a couple more weeks of training and with all the students back from school this week, we should be ready to go when the league opens.”

The pre-season concludes next weekend with a mini-tour weekend in Kingston, ON to face the panthers.  Training continues at Newtonbrook Secondary School on Monday and Thursday nights.  The Irish Women open up their 2005 league schedule with 2 games against the Yeomen Women on Sunday May 15^th at Fletcher’s Fields.