Titans still unbeaten after riding out storm
WITH Storm Brian battering the South West, Canterbury were hoping to storm the Titans fortress but were delayed when Brian blew out the door on their bus so the kick-off was put back to allow the City men time to prepare.
With a strong wind blowing it was Canterbury that had the advantage in the first half but Taunton were the team to put the pressure on the visitors and emerged victorious in the end.
With a scrum on the Canterbury five-metre line the Titans applied the pressure and were awarded several penalties and kept opting for the scrum. The one scrum that Canterbury held firm the ball was spun wide and winger Freddie Fraser squeezed into the corner.
Gary Kingdom missed the conversion from the touchline but the Titans kept on attacking. Tom Popham hit the line well and danced his way over to extend the Titans lead with Kingdom adding the extras to give them a 12-point lead. It seemed that it was all Taunton in the first half but on Canterbury’s first meaningful attack they caught the Titans napping and scrum-half Dan Smart went over for a try with centre Charlie Kingsman converting to make the half-time score 12-7.
Canterbury head coach Andy Pratt said after the game: “Taunton’s physicality was the difference in the first half. We have a lot of respect for Taunton as a club and in the first half we showed them too much respect and stood off them.
“We addressed this at half-time and stopped them playing and we managed to go through the phases and give them some problems.”
The City men certainly made some adjustments at
half-time and scored within two minutes on the resumption through winger Harry Sayers with Kingsman converting once again to give the visitors the lead for the first time.
The game then got scrappy. Canterbury were reduced to 14 men when Jimmy Green was binned and the hosts capitalised with a converted try from Ratu Vakalutukali who caught everyone by surprise with a quick tap penalty. Kingdom’s extra gave the Titans back the lead.
With 20 minutes still to play it was anyone’s game. Kingdom missed a penalty and the Titans were also reduced to 14 men as Aron Struminski was sent to the bin. Canterbury threw everything they could at the Titans but if it were not for some excellent defence, with a noticeable try-saving tackle from lock Stu Persey, and a turn over under their own posts by Fraser they could have lost their first game of the season.
Taunton Titans head coach Tony Yapp said: “In the first half we played well but should have finished some opportunities when we had them. Those nearly came back to haunt us. You can’t allow a team like Canterbury to stay in the game as they have the players to hurt you. We did well to hang on in the end.”