CAMBRIDGE EXILES 15 - 14 NEWMARKET III

 EXILES EXILED

It would be a cliché to say that the game – or, perhaps more accurately, the result – did not matter on this most poignant of days.  But it did; it really did. 

The Exiles turned up at the club to find themselves exiled. A series of unfortunate events which culminated in the caterers believing the game had been cancelled.  And so there were, no food and no bar – a state of affairs to be regretted at the best of times; a position of considerable embarrassment in the circumstances.  For Newmarket had come with a considerable band of supporters, to use the match to mark the passing of one of their players – Rob Hayes, who had been killed in action in Afghanistan only a few days earlier.  Just nineteen years of age, he was a product of Newmarket’s youth set-up and had last played for the club only a couple of weeks before Christmas.

So, Newmarket had assembled a suitable team of individuals who had played with Private Hayes, including a number of former colts, who had travelled back from their various universities specifically for the game.  “Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note” during the minute’s silence observed before the game; just a chill wind adding to the bitterness of a young life snatched away.

Once Phil Donoghue sounded his whistle to start the game, it soon became clear that the game mattered a great deal.  Newmarket wanted to win for their lost friend. And the Exiles needed to win, in order to keep their title hopes alive – against a Newmarket team full of ability and youth. With regular stand-off Sam Sandercock still on his way to the game, it was the boot of Exiles coach Guy Mulley that got the game under way, taking advantage of a wind that was to keep the opposition in their half for most of the first forty minutes.  However, the Exiles were clearly rusty after a long period of inaction and this was a relatively strong Newmarket side.  And so neither side made significant progress in the opening twenty minutes, despite solid work by the Exiles’ front five of Bob Cadwalladr, Steve Verney, Mike Shield, Dick Wallin and Julian O’Connell.

That was until the Exiles unveiled a back- row move from a scrum in our own half.  Dave Humphrey made the pick-up and first break, before Jack Luhrs progressed the incursion.  Great hands by Steve Everall got the ball to Laurent Espitalier and, not for the first time this season, our French winger did the rest, curving outside the clawing hands and speeding the remaining thirty yards to the line.  The Exiles were now 5-0 up.

For the rest of the first half it was the bitterly cold weather that was the winner, as both sides struggled to deliver up any coherent rugby, despite no lack of endeavour.  But there was one golden moment to savour, shortly before the break.  Newmarket, whose scrum were coping pretty well with the normally dominant Cambridge pack, had the put-in on their ten-metre line.  Harrassed by Luhrs, their scrum-half could only balloon a pass to his fly-half.  The ball never reached its destination, as Sean Gadsby plucked the ball from its arc and blistered the twenty-five metres to the line, to touch down under the posts.  The now arrived Sandercock potted the conversion, to give the Exiles a 12-0 lead at the break.

Although the game was far from won, skipper Ed Naylor remained true to the Exiles’ principles, by bringing on all of the substitutes for the second half.  It was particularly good to see Geraint James back after his broken finger in the autumn. 

Newmarket now had the wind behind them and a fierce determination to do their late colleague proud, several of their players succumbing to injury in their efforts to turn the game round.  They were rewarded for their enterprise in taking a tap penalty on their own twenty-two, using their coltish backs to outrun the Exiles’ scrambling defence and go all the way to the posts.  The resulting conversion made it 12-7 and the tide was now very much with Newmarket.  The Exiles were grateful to the spiteful conditions that caused the opposition’s moves to break down, when further scores seemed inevitable.

In what was then to prove a pivotal moment in the match, the Exiles elected to kick at goal from a penalty thirty metres out.  Despite kicking into the wind, Sandercock’s assured boot landed a vital three points, to extend the lead to 15-7.  Newmarket now needed to score twice and increasingly they had to play catch-up rugby, which always carries a risk.  It also carries reward and having kicked a penalty to the Exiles’ corner flag, their pack secured the line-out and then crashed over for a well-worked try.  The scoreline was now a nail-biting 15-14, with the Exiles simply trying to hang on.

Perhaps it was the emotion of the day or the frustration at the difficult conditions that caused the fraying of Newmarket tempers.  It was not malicious, but it reached a stage where referee Donoghue had to take a stand.  The resulting sin-binning that reduced Newmarket to fourteen men was of course met with some relief by the Exiles, but the overwhelming sensation in the circumstances was one of sadness.

Tom Arkwright only just failed to hold onto a cross-kick from Sandercock into the Newmarket in-goal area before Newmarket launched another length-of-pitch assault on the Exiles’ try line.  Desperate defence and the unkind conditions conspired to prevent a score and it was with considerable relief that the Exiles heard Donoghue blow his whistle for the last time that afternoon.

In the absence of any facilities at the club, the Exiles were unable to offer Newmarket the hospitality they so needed and deserved on this most poignant day.  The Exiles can only offer their apologies and we offer our deepest sympathy to Rob Hayes’ family and to his clubmates.

Squad: Cadwalladr (Law), Verney (Georgiadis), Shield (Boulding), Wallin, O’Connell, Gadsby,  Just (James), Humphrey, Luhrs, Mulley (Sandercock), Espitalier, Everall (Byrne), Naylor (capt), Arkwright (Waples), Austin