St Jacques had stormed to a 0-24 halftime lead and looked all set to secure an easy victory, however some poor second half defending and a resurgence from the Jersey side made for a nervous finish.

St Jacques Coach Jon Bell, who was absent from the game, had made a few changes ahead of the fixture and will be pleased with his sides’ first half performance.

St Jacques started very brightly, and didn’t look troubled in the early exchanges by the changes to the side. Martin Hepworth, playing his first game in over three years did well at scrum half, particularly in the first half. His distribution was decent and this allowed fly half Conor Murtagh to dictate the play well, as he had done all season. The St Jacques forwards were working well at the set piece and around the park. Ryan Jordan playing at No 8, again demonstrated his class with regular strong carries and good defensive work throughout the match. Hayden Dempsey & Leigh Cramphorn who have not seen much action this season both had a good game, and will have put themselves in the mix for a league fixture call up.

St Jacques were on the score sheet after only three minutes, with an excellent try from Robbie Titterington. The speedster collected the ball on the left touchline around halfway from Airy Cleere, who had carried well from a sustained St Jacques attack, before managing to offload to the winger who made no mistake to storm home to score. Conor Murtagh missed the conversion.

United Banks were not really in the game, and St Jacques were continually playing on the front foot causing problems. Not surprisingly it was the man of the match Airy Cleere who scored next for the Black and Yellows. The big centre who had a fine game throughout stormed through the Banks defence from inside the twenty two metre zone at pace, diving over the line to score. Murtagh missed the conversion. Ryan Jordan also got on the score sheet before half time, as did Piers Ockleford. The latter scoring a fine interception try from halfway. Murtagh converted both tries.

Stand in Coach James Mroch was forced into making an unplanned change just before halftime, with Hayden Dempsey feeling unwell due to his diabetes and being replaced by Jon Herbert.

After the break St Jacques were not playing with the same intend of the first half, and the scrum appeared to fall to pieces, losing their own ball on a couple of occasions. The substitution of Dempsey seemed to have really unsettled matters.

Banks were now playing with spirit, and were using their forwards to secure ground, something they have always been renowned for. They scored two quick unconverted tries with forward drives, before Conor Murtagh replied. The fly half collected the ball out wide following a Robbie Titterington break to dive over and score. This seemed to stir Banks even further, as they went on to score three unanswered tries in the space of five minutes to come within two points of the visitors. However the nerves of St Jacques were put to bed when veteran Jack Webber managed to cross the line for a converted try with a couple of minutes to go. This was enough to ensure victory for the visitors, from what was far from a convincing victory in the end.

After the game stand in coach James Mroch said “Well that truly was a game of two halves. We played excellent in the first half, however that second half performance was not great. Fair play to Banks they stuck at it and did what they do well, which is keeping it in the forwards. We must adapt to this better however or on another day we could have lost this. The lads who came in today did very well, and will have certainly done their chances of playing more first team rugby no harm at all.”

Guernsey St Jacques Vikings

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