Feast of tries for Sydenham

Press, 24 March 1977, Page 32

Feast of tries for Sydenham

By

JOHN COFFEY

It was a night for the tries and the tryers when the Canterbury rugby league qualifying round began at the Show Grounds last evening.

Sydenham, its new recruits bringing with them a fresh vitality to one of the (province’s oldest clubs, provided the tries — 13 in all as it humbled Woolston, 55-! 5, in the curtain-raiser. I And although MaristWestem Suburbs finished the main match with a 36-7 advantage, there was much to admire in the manner

i with which its opponent,. ! Riccarton, never relaxed its' efforts and actually bustled) Marist into error for much! of the time. Bruce Dickison, captaining Sydenham in his debut after transferring from Christ-church-Eastern Suburbs, required only three minutes to contribute the first of his three tries and Woolston was simply out-classed from that point. Only when Sydenham dropped its scoring rate to seven points in the second quarter was there any lapse in the one-wav traffic. Yet Woolston had an almost equal share of scrum possession, and a very incisive stand-off half, Glenn Wineera. Otherwise, the Sydenham pack was just too

l big, powerful and speedy for jits rival and the pace of Dickison and Francis LawIrence ensured that any lax tackling in mid-field proved costly.Marist promised much when it had 11 points in a little worse than even time, before Riccarton — doing surprisingly well in set play and benefiting from a 20-13 penalty count — capitalised on a steady stream of Marist errors to spend long periods deep in Marist’s territory. The veteran Riccarton prop, Mita Mohi, was the hardest working player in the game, upsetting Marist’s positional pattern with his bulldogging style. However, Mocky Brereton was even more effective when Marist

did make use of its threequarters, and Chris Charlton, Michael O’Donnell, Gerard Stokes and Stefan Hatipov also reached a standard that will be expected of them in premier football. Most of Riccarton's determined work was wasted by a lack of cover-defence. The Marist outside backs, especially Brereton and Charlton, were not cornered quickly enough, and two forwards, Hatipov and John McCue, were able to run more than 60 metres to touch down. On the evidence shown last evening, Sydenham should acquit itself creditably in the top grade. Marist will need to tidy up its fundamental manoeuvres when it joins it. For Woolston and Riccarton, there is

I the bleak certainty of an- . other term in the premier B I section, and probably the ' loss of several of their better players to higher-placed clubs. Scorers were. —

Sydenham 55 (B. I. Dickison three, F. A. Lawrence two, T. Mene two. E. Wlodkowski two, M. Ward two, B. A. Bigwood, K. R. Corkran tries; S. J. Holden six, Lawrence two goals) beat Woolston 5 (D. Adams try: P. Lagrosse goal). Half-time: '25-3. Marist 36 (M. P. Brereton three, S. N. Hatipov. .1. A. P. Vaughan, M. W. .1. O’Donnell, C. Charlton. J. McCue tries; O'Donnell six goals) beat Riccarton 7 (M. Kitto try; P. Everett two goals). Half-time: 16-5.