St. Catharines Away ... er... Home

Grimsby Gentlemen 46: St. Catharines Tigers 19

Venue:  It was to be played in St. Catharines but some city official was there to tell them they could not play because of insurance problems.  Since this was their first backup field we moved to their second backup field in Grimsby. This included including their women's team who were playing Hamilton. The women played at 1:20 and the men went on about 2:35.  The women's team included some Beamsville graduates and narrowly defeated the Hamilton team.

Referee:  Dave Moffatt from London ** (we were not used to a lot of his calls in the rucks  like binding  to a player on the ground) but the rest of the games seemed well done.

Weather:  Nice day for rugby a bit of a wind. Rain came just after the final whistle (great for spectators and coaches)

Attendance:  I think the supporters bus (with Paul Rohner) went to St. Catharines and didn't get the message.

Team:: 1. Nick Lord, 2. Brendan Sculland(60 min) 3. Ross Matheson(C) (60 min),  4.Jeremy Young (40 min), 5. Martin Van Den Hurk 6. Adam Meehan (65 min) , 7. Bob Mavro, 8. Mark Woodward, 9. Nick Lemieux (50 min), 10. Martin Colyn, 11. Will George (Sassy), 12. Vic Blaney, 13. Dillon Trimble , 14. Jamie Farrell, 15. Jake D'Achille (60 min) , 16. Jon Millington (40 min) 17. James Vienneau (30 min), 18. Colin Comfort (40 min), 19. Dirk Reichow (15 min), 20. Derick Weber (20 min)

Injured Alex Easton and Kyle Wilson
Unavailable Chris Fothergill and T.J. 
(Call home): Alex Millar, Pat Brown and Sam Berg

Coaches comments:  St. Catharines men are having a horrendous season and this complication did not help them morale wise.  I was actually thinking we might get an away win for the first time since 2012 when we beat Waterloo in Brantford (they had to loan us two players) but it kind of turned out to be a home win.  We started slow and St. Catharines pressed us to our line and probably should have scored a try but it was called back by the referee for being held up. We survived that and perhaps a bit of dirty play on their part led to us getting riled up (or at least Bob). A longish stretch of us moving the ball into the backs then recycling for several phases resulted in a try at about 10 minutes (I think Vic had his hands on the ball three times in the drive before he scored.).  Conversion by Dillon.  However St. Catharines, using the wind, got the ball into our end and managed to disorganize us enough to score at about twenty minutes.  At thirty minutes from a scrum, our number eight Mark, quickly picked the ball and was not to be denied as he ran twenty-five meters to score in the corner.  Dillon dropped the conversion as coolly as anything. However the last play of the half led to St. Catharines  roaring back to score and tie the game up (it was the best time for them to score). We were playing well with a good scrum against a always strong Tigers scrum and very competitive in lineouts and running well with the ball so the team was still fairly confident.

Half time score: Grimsby Gentlemen 14: St. Carharines Tigers 14

We got the upper hand at the start of the second half and after a good driving lineout, Mark broke and fed to Nick Lemieux who scored near the posts with an added conversion by Dillon at about 45 minutes.  Dillon then slotted a penalty to put us up by 10.  However,  here come the Tigers who, at about 50 minutes, score and with a missed conversion.  These are points by the Tigers while  Grimsby keeps going.
A few minutes later, Dillon, who has moved to scrum half, takes a feed from the #8 (Mark again) and scores for his ninth try in only 6 games and he also adds the conversion. And a couple of minutes after that Vic takes the ball for a 50 meter jaunt, knocks over a few would be tacklers, and kindly offloads to Sassy (Will) for his first try of the season.  Dillon does not hit the conversion but at 60 minutes kicks another  penalty to make up for the miss. We change tactics and start to kick more often but do not do as well as when we have ball in hand. The final try, at seventy-five minutes,  is a heads up play by Bob and is converted by Dillon.

Final Score: Grimsby Gentlemen 46: St. Catharines Tigers 19

Dillon Trimble 1 T, 5 C, 2 P  (21 pts)
Vic Blaney  1 T (5 pts)
Mark Woodward 1 T (5 pts)
Nick Lemieux  1 T (5 pts)
Will George 1 T (5 pts)
Bob Mavro 1 T (5 pts)

Well done Gentlemen, most players took the change in venue well although we did not know how to warm up when a women's game is being played ahead of our game.

This is us trying to figure out how to warm up  

Fine series of recycles led to the first try by Vic

Scoring after a great run.

It was a day when Kiwi number eights were just on fire (leading to a try by Dillon) 

Actually Dillon's 9th try in only six games

Although you cannot see him,. Sassy has just scored. he is somewhere beside Vic

Thanks to Jamie Farrell, Tim Millar, Paul Rohner, Dillon Trimble and Alex Easton to puting up the fence for the Happening at the Forty for the Jazz and Wine event Friday afternoon.  And to Ross Matheson, Dillon Trimble, Paul Rohner, Billy Stabler and Martin Colyn for taking it down.  It was worth $500 to the club (minus some thank you beers).

There has been one hit from New Zealand on the blog today so Hi Dean.  There have also been sixteen from China this week (I apologize if you are trying to learn English from this blog)

Next Game Aug 9th in Wilmot.

Flag Rugby in St. Catharines

A few photos of the flag rugby tournament in St. Catharines.  Grimsby had 11 (two teams) in the younger group (jk to grade 2) and 5 in the middle group grades 3 to 5).  Lots of running. .

pre game organization?

This is our two teams against each other (Grubbers vs Grasshoppers)

running

tagging

scoring

waiting

getting the flag belt back on

Intermediates in Action.

A pretty good day overall. Thanks to all players and parents. 

Next two tournaments are in Grimsby

Guelph away

 Grimsby Gentlemen 12: Guelph Redcoats 69

Venue: Exhibition Park, Guelph (not the turf field under lights at the University like last year)

Weather:  overcast, a little rainy about 25 degrees

Referee: Peter Darbishire  (did well and we are hard on refs)

Attendance:  not many (probably a good thing - no witnesses so I can lie)

Team:: 1. Nick Lord, 2. Ross Matheson(C), 3. Jon Millington, 4.Jeremy Young (40 min), 5. Adam Meehan , 6. Brendan Sculland(60 min), 7. Bob Mavro, 8. Alex Easton, 9. Dillon Trimble, 10. Martin Colyn, 11. Will George, 12. Vic Blaney, 13. Chris Fothergill (60 min), 14. T.J.(70 min), 15. Jake D'Achille, 16. James Vienneau (40 min), 17. Colin Comfort (40 min), 18. Dirk Reichow (10 min).

Game:  It was probably a record loss for us (at least since records have been kept).  We lost to Waterloo (their Cambridge team) 66 - 10 on June 5th 2010 the difference being 56 points compared to the 57 last Saturday.  There was a game against Hamilton seconds in Hamilton on July 7, 2012 which was pretty big but I did not record the score because I didn't want to (Hamilton firsts were not playing that day).  I have it on tape and could find out but that would mean I would have to watch the whole game again.

Anyway, I missed the first half trying to get through Toronto  from camping near Peterborough.  It seems like I missed a lot of good rugby by the Redcoats.  They seemed to have a team who have a lot of players who play together for the University. I hear we started slow and got slower.

Half time score Grimsby Gentlemen 0: Guelph Redcoats 40

The second 40 min seemed to go a little better although Guelph scored off the first series of plays and then scored fairly quickly again after that.  At about 55 minutes with some strong forward work and keeping possession, Dillon scored to put us on the board.  We continued to have trouble containing Guelph. We missed a lot of tackles by not being aggressive enough which allowed them to continue to score pretty regularly. Near the end, Martin made a strong run (hard line back towards the ruck) off a breakdown and broke through their defense to score under the posts.  Dillon converted to complete our scoring.

Dillion scoring his 8th try of the season

T.J. getting down to Guelph's five meter

We did well in our lineouts

Martin making a break

And Chris Aston scoring

Vic was selected as man of the match as he had some good runs and did a lot of tackling.  Great tackling was also done by our fullback Jake D'Achille.
So back to the practice field and at least we are not St. Catharines (who we play this weekend) so stay tuned.

Sometime in the last few days we passed 20,000 hits on the blog since it started in Nov 2008.

 Bonus: Fourth of the series:   Tats of the team

Added Bonus: Pictures of two former presidents of the Grimsby Gentlemen in its early years.

First President of the Gentlemen way back in 1977, Bob Hepburn

Scott Nicolson (now lives in Nova Scotia) 

As an added added bonus you get some camping pixs

Granddaughter Alexis

24th year of camping

Stratford at home

Grimsby Gentlemen 24: Stratford Blackswans 30

Venue: Alway Field

Weather : Mid twenties,lower humidity,clear skies,high uv.

Referee: Ian Stewart

Atterndance:  a poor guess would be in the hundreds (mainly made up of old presidents of the club (5 in fact) I am the present president but I count because I am old. The presidents are (in order)  Bob Hepburn,( the clubs first president in 1977)  Scott Nicolson, Alex Easton (who played in the game) , Andy Breuls and Bill Stuart.
I would normally have pictures of them all but I forgot to bring that thingee that fits in the camera that holds the pictures. But Jennifer, our staff photographer and salad maker, took some and I will attach them when I get them. Keep checking.

Team: 1. Nick Lord, 2. Ross Matheson, 3. Jon Millington, 4.Jeremy Young, 5. Adam Meehan (40 min), 6. Brendan Sculland(60 min), 7. Mark Woodgate, 8. Alex Easton, 9. Dillon Trimble, 10. Derick Weber (C)(10 min), 11. Will George, 12. Vic Blaney, 13. Martin Colyn, 14. Jake D'Achille, 15. Jamie Farrell, 16. James Vienneau (20 min), 17. Martin Van Den Hurk, 18. Dirk Reichow, 18 T.J. (40 min) This is Tafari Cole's first league game with Grmsby although he played an exhibition against Buffalo this season and against Philadelphia last season.  T.J. has been playing rugby league all spring, (yellow card) 20. Chris Fothergill (70 min) This is Chris's first game with Grimsby and he has played with Redeemer College in the past.

Game:  We are playing the number one team in the league with four wins and one loss and have scored 224 points vs 96 against in those games. We are near the bottom with two wins (one by default)  and have scored 86 points and have 125 scored against in four games.  So you would expect Stratford to be fairly confident even though last year they came to Grimsby and we tied them to spoil their perfect season. However they were not expecting Dillion.  We kept the ball in the Stratford end for much of the first part of the game and were rewarded at about 10 minutes Dillon grabbed a loose ball and scored the first try. Unfortunately we lost our Derrick on the play with a suspected broken toe so Martin moved to 10 with Chris playing outside center. We kept control of the game and at 19 minutes Dillon scrambled again to score and completed the conversion. Unfortunately Stratford started to work the ball and hit a penalty at about 30 min and scored a converted try just at the end of the half. We were doing very well in the lineouts both getting our own and spoiling theirs. Except for the last 10 minutes it was the best first half this year.

Half time score: Dillon Trimble 12: Stratford Blackswans 10.

At the start of the half, the Swans controlled the ball and a penalty quickly put them up by one point.  However a driving maul from a lineout resulted in an unconverted try by Alex Easton  at about 50 minutes to give us the lead.  Not sure about the exact time as they kept having water breaks (not in my day). Then Stratford scored by a good run in the backs at 60 minutes to put us down by 3.  But we (Dillon) were not done and we scored at about 70 minutes with Dillon again converting.  We needed to control the ball for the  last 10 minutes but could not and several high tackles led to a yellow card. Stratford eventually scored a converted try near the end and on then they kicked a penalty to end the game.

Final:  Grimsby Gentlemen 24: Stratford Blackswans 30

Ross tracking a Blackswan (picture of the week for ORU)

The obvious choice of man of the match by the other team should have been Dillon with 19 of our points but they chose Alex Easton who stole a lot of their lineout ball. Dillon probably was relieved as even though he plays like a big man he does not guzzle beer like one.  Dillion has scored seven tries in four games.

Vic did a great job with the food and Jennifer with the salads.  Thanks to Elizabeth who worked behind the bar.

Coaches Remarks:
Stratford suggested they did not play well and they might not have but we played better than we have in the last few games.We came out strong in the first twenty minutes which we do not usually do and we took them in the lineouts and attacked well from the base of the rucks. Ultimately our tackling was not accurate and aggressive enough and could not pin them back in their end nor stop them when we needed to. It was a good game with six lead changes in the second half. We did get 2 bonus points (one for scoring 4 tries and one for coming within 7 points) which is the most you can get for a loss. Good practices last week and lets take this particular show on the road against the Redcoats away in Guelph.

I am going camping with the family so I do not know when pictures will be added to the blog.

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Crusaders IV at home

Grimsby Gentlemen vs Crusaders IV

Venue: Alway School

Weather: mid twenties - a really nice day for a game

Referee: Brian Chapple (supposedly)

Team:  Oakville did not show

Where's the beef?

Crusaders could not get enough players for the game on Saturday (a little late in telling us) so we had a small practice.  New acquisition, Chris Fothergill missed his chance to play his first game with Grimsby but should be able to play this Saturday against Stratford (if they don't cry off).

Chris

Last November Canada hosted and played the New Zealand Maori All Blacks at BMO field in Toronto and even though we lost it was a sell out game of about 22 000 spectators.  The most ever to watch a 15 a side game in North America (there have been 50 000 at the Las Vegas Sevens).  So why do the real All Blacks play the USA in Chicago this November and not play Canada?  There are 6.6 million rugby players in the world in 119 countries of which 2.36 million are registered and 4.3 million are non-registered.  Of those England itself has 2 028 348 players itself (that is where the All Blacks go after the USA) but the number two country is the USA with 1 402 962 players.  There is a huge audience in the Chicago area and half the tickets for Soldier's Field were sold in three days.
The third most players are in Australia (483 000) then South Africa (387 000), France (359,022), Ireland (177,604), Fiji (156 140), New Zealand (150 000),Canada at 129 131 then Japan (119 500).  Note Fiji has more rugby players than New Zealand.

Hopefully Grimsby will get a few more players in the next few years with the introduction of rugby at Blessed Trinity a triple A catholic high school in Grimsby.  We have being trying to get in there for awhile and  Jim Graff made a proposal which they seemed to have accepted.

I tried to send around an email with a picture of myself getting stitched up on the sidelines early in a game in 1977.  It was the last game of the season and the Hamilton Hornets playing Balmy Beach and the winner would be the Ontario champs (present day Marshall).  This was before substitutes were allowed and we would have had to play one man sort but the referee held up the game to allow one of the players, Dr. Mike Taylor, to put in a couple of stitches and I returned. Hamilton won the game 15 to 3. It was sent to me because it is the 60th anniversary of the Hamilton Hornets this year.  This picture and the article appeared in the Hamilton Spectator.  Some people could not open it because they were using their phones (get a real computer) and I wanted to put it here but I can't figure out how to do it.

An announcement will come very soon about our Trillium grant which will be good news.

Next game (hopefully) is this Saturday July 12th at home against Stratford.

Hey did you see that those skinny under-fed football fall downs from Germany beat Brazil with a converted try.  Way to go boys.