The Tribesmen travelled to Cork PBC grounds last Saturday to take on the Cork Bulls in game 3 of the ROI Rugby League Championship.
The game was played on a dry day in blustery conditions and immediately from the kickoff both sets of forwards tested each other with some big physical challenges. It wasn’t long however, until the Tribesmen stole the advantage when big prop forward Enda Stanford crashed over the line to registered a try as early as the 3rd minute. This was duly converted by scrumhalf Conor Loughrey to give the Tribesmen a 6-point lead. The Galway men quickly doubled their lead just a couple of minutes later when Captain James ‘Junior’ Kennedy skipped through the defence, and with the conversion added the visitors were 12 points ahead.
The Bulls however were not going to roll over and some sustained pressure due to sloppy handling errors by the Tribesmen earned the Bulls their first score. Some lacklustre defence from the Tribesmen allowed the Bulls to sneak across the line again and with only a quarter of the 1st half gone the score was 12-8 to the Tribesmen. The Tribesmen resumed their composure and a break by full back Johnny Long resulted in his first try of the day and with the conversion scored the lead was stretched to 18-8. The remainder of the 1st half was characterised by poor defence and handling errors by both teams and both teams managed to register another score before the break with Kennedy scoring his 2nd try of the day for the Tribesmen. The game was held up for a period just before half time,10 metres out from the Bulls line when a head clash between Bulls stalwart Mick Milne and Tribesmen Sean O’Gorman resulted in nasty looking bloody wounds for them both. As both men were treated on the pitch the referee drew the half to close with the scores at 22-18 to the Tribesmen.
The early part of the 2nd half showed a more consistent performance by the Tribesmen and their talented scrumhalf, Conor Loughrey registered a brace of tries in quick succession, this was quickly followed by a 3rd score for Kennedy. With 2 out of the 3 conversions kicked this put the scores at 38-18 to the Tribesmen. The men from the West continued their dominance and Enda Stanford crossed the line for his 2nd try on the 60th min. The game was held up again soon after with another head injury, this time to Tribesman Conor Loughrey. An elbow to the head at coincidentally the same place on the field as the previous incident, meant that the player had to be led from the field nursing a gushing wound. Once play had resumed, the Tribesmen pick up where they had left off and Johnny Long registered his 2nd try which was converted by Paul Power. The Bulls however were not done and a late flourish resulted in a couple of tries and one conversion. The afternoons proceeding though were rounded off by Tribesman Sean O’Gorman, who had returned to the field of play with his head heavily bandaged. His score was to be the final action of the match and the game finished at 52-28 to the Tribesmen.
The Tribesmen roll on unbeaten so far this year and now face the Dublin City Exiles next Saturday at South Park (The Swamp) at 2pm. The Tribesmen defeated the Exiles in the ROI semi-final last year so the visitors will be looking for revenge. Get yourselves down to swamp from 2pm onwards for all the action in what promises to be a mouth-watering challenge.
