Fine victory for Coleraine Inst Firsts in Banbridge

COLERAINE Inst travelled to Banbridge Academy and came away with a 17-5 victory.

The visitors started the game poorly, giving away several penalties in a first five minutes littered with errors.

After Coleraine infringed at a ruck Banbridge had the opportunity to open the scoring but fortunately for the away side, the hosts could not capitalise as their out half missed from the penalty.

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However, from the resulting 22 restart Academy took full advantage of an overlap and scored in the corner. The conversion was missed.

The try brought the CAI team to life and they responded well! After retaining possession for several phases they were awarded a penalty 30 metres out in front of the posts when Banbridge infringed at a ruck and Mikey Poskitt kicked the points to reduced the deficit to 5-3.

A rejuvenated Coleraine then scored an impressive try full of free flowing running rugby.

Centre Stuart McCaffery threw an outrageous dummy and had the pace to outstrip three defenders to score under the posts with Poskitt adding the points.

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Following a sustained period of pressure Coleraine thought they scored again through Michael Poskitt but due to the referee’s vision being blocked the try was ruled out.

Inst continued to press and with 15 minutes left sealed victory when the impressive Farrell took a quick penalty gained 30 metres, then fed No8 Connor who then drew the last defender to put left wing Alan Clarke away for a well worked score in the left corner. Poskitt kicked the conversion attempt.

Afterwards coach Richard Beggs said: “This is always a tough place to come and get a result.

“The result was pleasing but we have a lot to work on in the upcoming weeks. There were some excellent performances today, especially from our captain Paddy Farrell, also the pack as a whole bullied a much bigger pack in the set piece and dominated in the loose.”

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