LONDON SKOLARS 22
COVENTRY BEARS 28
Skolars suffered a narrow loss in their final pre-season friendly, with fellow BetFred League 1 side Coventry Bears holding on for victory after Skolars had pulled back an early deficit.
Coventry opened the scoring after Reece Rance took advantage of a Skolars’ error from a high kick. They scored a second after Dan Coates and Matt Welham combined in a break to put Skolars onto the backfoot, before moving the ball to the right. With an overlap Charles Hammond had go for an intercept to stop a try, but he couldn’t gather the ball clealy and Jack Dawson picked up the loose ball to score.
Skolars had to defend again after they gave away a penalty for offside at the kick-off and they went further behind when. Kieran Sherratt scored the Bears’ third try. Skolars got back into the game with two tries late in the first half. First Mike Greenhalgh raced onto a Neil Thorman kick that bounced awkwardly for the defence. Four minutes later Omari Caro intercepted a pass ten metres from his own line before racing downfield leaving Skolars 10-18 behind at half-time.
Coventry extended their lead.when Haydn Freeman took a Dan Coates kick a kick to the left. However, a Coventry error in their own half allowed Skolars to attack and Lamont Bryan powered over from two metres out. A Jacob Thomas break was continued by Iliess Macani to set up an attacking position for the home side, Phil Lyon following up his grubber kick to score with Neil Thorman converting to level the scores.
Skolars were the strongest team at that point but a sidestep by Jordan Paga found enough of gap in the defence to touchdown with Coates adding his fourth conversion of the afternoon. That gave Coventry a six point lead and Skolars couldn’t find a way through the defence in the final stages.
LONDON SKOLARS
1 Iliess Macani
2 Omari Caro
3 Jonah Varela
4 Kam Peace-Paul
5 Charles Hammond
6 Phil Hammond
7 Jacob Thomas
8 Christian Gale
9 Tom Firth
10 Eddie Mbaraga
11 Adam Vranos
12 Mike Greenhalgh
13 Rob Oakley
Subs (all used)
14 Louis Singleton
15 Michael Sykes
16 Neil Thorman
17 James Tyas
18 Errol Carter
19 Marcus Hockey
20 Josh Dalton
21 Lameck Juma
22 Lamont Bryan
Tries: M Greenhalgh (31), Caro (33), Bryan (58), Lyon (63)
Goals: Thorman 3/4
COVENTRY BEARS
1 Nathan Hill
2 Reece Rance
3 Jack Dawson
4 Matt Welham
5 Hayden Freeman
6 Jordan Paga
7 Dan Coates
8 Peter Ryan
9 Chris Collimore
10 Josh Dunne
11 Jed Charlton
12 Elliott Townsend
13 Kieran Sherratt
Subs (all used)
14 Dan Bedford
15 Delanie Bedward
16 Brad Sheridan
17 Douglas Chirnside
18 Morgan Dawes
19 Kadeem William
20 Harry Kaufman
21 Darius Hamilton
Tries: Rance (5), Dawson (19), Sherratt (27), Freeman (55), Paga (67)
Goals: Coates 4/5
Penalty count: 5-6
Half-time: 10-18
Referee: Cameron Worsley
SCORING SEQUENCE: 0-6, 0-12, 0-18, 6-18, 10-18; 10-22; 16-22, 22-22, 22-2
