AMERICAN DOMINANCE
Canada loses in rugby match
In a friendly that was anything but on Saturday afternoon at Twin Elm Rugby Park, Canada took a bit of a beating to its psyche as well as on the field in a 41-23 loss to the United States.
Not only was the loss the third straight to the Americans and the second in three weeks, but it kept the Canadians winless in 2015 with only three matches remaining before the start of the Rugby World Cup, which begins Sept. 18 in London.
Canada will next travel to Halifax for a match next Saturday against the Glasgow Warriors, a club team that will be fired up to try and knock off the national squad.
They then have two more matches in the United Kingdom ahead of their first World Cup match Sept. 19 against Ireland, the third-ranked nation in the world.
Canada is currently ranked 18th, two positions lower than the Americans, who also defeated Canada 1513 in a Pacific Nations Cup match in Burnaby on Aug. 3.
“We’re hurting a little,” Team Canada captain Aaron Carpenter said following Saturday’s loss, a particularly difficult one for his team to take since it started well and in stretches looked like it was finally going to break through for a win.
“It was a difficult day. We played some real good stretches of rugby but we let ourselves down with little details. We left too many points out there,’’ said Carpenter.
Some of those little details were actually big deals as the Canadians’ inability to hold onto the ball led to several turnovers that led to many U.S. points.
And then there were the defensive breakdowns, in particular a slight shimmy fake by Andrew Suniula that opened up a huge hole and led to a long run for a try that, once converted, gave the Americans a 27-16 lead and essentially the match.
That came after Canada, which trailed 17-6 at the half, had cut the Americans’ lead to 20-16 on secondhalf tries from Taylor Paris and Nick Blevins. The Suniula try came with Canadian Phil Mack off for 10 minutes after getting a yellow card from referee Stuart Berry of South Africa for stamping on a U.S. defender.
Along with the Suniula try, the Americans also got a try from Mike Petri on the penalty to take a 34-16 lead.
“In the second half, we got back into it, kept the ball, put some phases together,” Canadian head coach Kieran Crowley said.
“We’re giving up too many penalties, too much stupidity around that area and too many turnovers. It just wasn’t good enough."
Carpenter had a late try after Mack got back into the play and it was converted by Nathan Hirayama, who took over from Gordon McRorie, who had missed two previous conversions. That pulled Canada to within 34-23, but another defensive letdown at the end of the match allowed Cam Dolan to score. A.J. MacGinty converted the try to close out the scoring.
Things started very well for Canada as McRorie hit a penalty and drop goal for a 6-0 lead 10 minutes in before the Americans scored the next 17 points on tries from Greg Petersen and Andrew Durutalo.
Along with Canada and Ireland, Group D at the World Cup will include France, Italy and Romania.
The Americans will be in Group B along with South Africa, Samoa, Scotland and Japan. The event runs until Oct. 31.