ICRC WIN BRANTFORD PRE SEASON TOURNEY

 

Ed Gardner's try midway through the second half gave the Irish a 10-5 win over Cup Holders Oakville Crusaders in the final of the Brantford Money Tournament.

The Irish had beaten Fergus and Balmy Beach en route to the final; Cru downed Waterloo and Brantford to get there.

Game One-

The Irish subdued a scrappy Fergus team by 11-10 in round one play. Countless unforced handling and tackling errors let the Highlanders into the game,and only Dave Bergerons try early in the second half let the greens escape with a win.

Game Two-

After surrendering an early try, the ICRC scored 33 straight points to beat Beach 33-5 in the semi-final.  Jadon Schmidt, Tom Madden, Dave Bergeron and Simon Jackson scored tries, and Ed Gardner kicked three penalties and two conversions.

"A much better performance," said coach Mark Winokur, "we finally looked the way we want to-running rugby with lots of pressure."

Final-

The two old rivals slugged it out for forty minutes, with the ICRC looking slightly fitter at the end as Gardner sliced through to score under the posts to decide the issue. The game was high quality throughout, with Cru losing key players in the scrum late in the game to hurt their come back chances.

A serious facial injury to lock Ramzi Azar marred an otherwise promising day. "Still much work to be done for the league opener against the Beach- they will be much, much tougher in 2 weeks."

The development side was not as successful at the Alliston tourney, losing 3 games,

Firsts and development sides are at Sherwood Forest Park in Burlington on Saturday at 1:30 and 3 pm.