The second match in Phase 2 of the Leinster League was an early start on a nice January morning against the Portlaoise Blue team. A new electronic scoreboard was recently installed by the club, and this was the first matched played using the news scoreboard. The match was recorded, and the recording helped to get the details for this report.
Highlights from the first half: • The first score of the match started with a clearance kick by Portlaoise, collected by Mary, who ran back and was tackled, then Nicole and Abbie followed up with runs to get to the opposition 22, before Hannah broke through the Portlaoise defence to score a try. Hannah knocked over the conversion. • The second score started with a turnover to Gorey, Rosie, passed to Robyn who had a good run to the opposition 22 line, followed up by runs by Chloe and Amelia before Leah offloaded to Heather who ran to score a try, followed up by a conversion. • From the next play, Hannah broke free from the halfway line and scored a try. • Hannah kicked the ball to clearing our lines, this was caught by Mary, who dodged her way for 20 yards, before off-loading the ball to Rachel, who was stopped just before the line, but off-loaded to Heather who passed on to Leah for a super try. • Portlaoise then had a period of pressure but were stopped just short of the line. The clearing kick reached halfway where some good chasing from Robyn and Riana was followed up a turnover by Aisling leading to a good attack that unfortunately ended in a knock-on. • Another score started with a super kick by Hannah and another chase by Robyn, that left the girls with a penalty on the Portlaoise 22 line; from the penalty Hannah spilt the defence to run in for a try. • From a scrum on the halfway line, Hannah ran to the opposition 22, this was followed up by runs from Rosie, Heather and Issy before Hannah scored again. The halftime the girls were well clear, which was a great position to be in.
Second half highlights: • The first score of the second half was to Gorey, it started with strong runs by Leah, Issy and Heather before Portlaoise knocked-on, and from the resulting scrum Hannah scored again. • A 40-yard run by Rachel was stopped by an injury. From the resulting scrum, Heather had a great run to score in the corner. • A Portlaoise player broke through the Gorey defence, but was stopped by Hannah who tacked, released and then got the ball for a Gorey turnover, super defence. • This was followed by a run by Heather, who was stopped just short of the Portlaoise try line, but she off-loaded to Amelia who ran in for a try. • From the kick-off, the ball was collected by Hannah, who ran and dodged her way back for a super try.
The final score will go down as 52-0 to Gorey, well done to all the team.
Next weekend the team is on a bus journey to Roscrea, kick off is at 13:00 on Saturday.
