Kendal U15 25 - Furness U15 7

After last week’s game of two halves; Kendal produced a more complete game against Furness.
The Furness team is largely made up of players from several of Barrow’s RL teams, but they hadn’t managed to play very many games of Union yet this season.
Man for man, both teams looked evenly matched with strong and skilful runners on both sides; however it was evident from early in the game that Kendal’s greater Union knowledge would be invaluable, as they were able to dominate a lot of the possession through better technique and cohesion at the breakdown areas.
Much of the opening exchanges took part in Furness’s half and after 7 minutes Kendal’s centres, Olly and Tyler were able to provide Casper with a half chance out on the wing, which he duly took, showing exceptional pace to beat the covering tacklers and speed in from the 22 for a try in the left corner.
This spurred Furness into life and Kendal needed to show some grit in defence to stop their strong runners, with Joe C, Logan and Alex K all making several good tackles, that allowed the likes of Joe M, Harry and Alex S to jackal well and secure turnover ball that Iestyn and Alfie used well to ease the pressure with good kicks in behind the Furness defence.
Kendal got their second try after 20 mins following a good carry from the base of the scrum by Will and several rucks later, Logan was able to score a similar try to the previous week, using his power to force the ball over the try line despite the attentions of a few defenders. Alfie slotted the difficult conversion for a 12-0 lead. Kendal were playing with the advantage of the wind and so continued to push for more points but could only manage a penalty in the final seconds for a 15-0 half time lead.
Furness found themselves on the back foot from the second half re-start, but were clearing their lines well, only to be put under more pressure through good kick returns from Casper, Roan and Cam and when they tried to run the ball back themselves; Olly and Caleb met them with some dominant tackles.
By now Kendal’s scrum was also getting on top, following the introduction of Kurt and Jack and they managed to steal one against the head, which was followed by good carries from Will and Nathan, that allowed Alex S to barge his way over for the third try.
Half way through the second half Furness looked to stage a comeback, and their No 8 who had carried strongly all game, broke through and raced home from the half way line to score under the posts; 20-7. Furness were unable to build on this however, as Kendal’s pack took charge of the game, keeping possession for long spells, before the final score came with 2 minutes remaining as Tyler took advantage of some tired players to break several attempted tackles to score on the left wing for a final score of 25-7.
The game was played in fantastic spirit, everyone enjoying the hard physical confrontation, clearly happy to be getting some game time after the recent weather cancellations. I’m sure the return fixture at Furness will be an equally entertaining game and very likely a much closer result once the Furness boys have had more game time.