Hoops hattrick hero seals deal

Captain fantastic Luke Webber put his hand up for a man-of-the-match performance scoring an incredible hattrick for St Alban’s College, leading from the front and making sure his team won a close encounter 21-15.

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A slow start to the fixture saw the match starting off like a bit of a Sunday afternoon drive with not all that much happening. It was only near the end of the first half that the sides ramped up a gear to change the momentum of play.

St Alban’s were the first to score after securing a lineout through a penalty kick, The Hoops seized the opportunity to drive a strong maul scoring in the lefthand corner allowing Luke Webber to gather the ball and score.

On the stroke of the final whistle for the first half, St Albans scored a second try for the match, this time through a tap-and-go penalty which saw captain Luke Webber again burst through the defence of Northcliff to add an additional five points to the score.

Going into the break the scoreline read 14-0 with Northcliff pressing hard into the St Albans half. A few handling errors led to a number of knock-ons in strong positions which resulted in handing back possession to the home team.

The visitors came out all guns blazing, with nothing to lose where a team effort saw the boys from Johannesburg setting up their first try of the game within minutes of the second getting underway. Against the run of play, the team strung together a strong offensive play which was ignited by Zenovian Johnson.

Northcliff’s Jordan Swanepoel scored the try and showed some good skill throughout the match, manoeuvring and dummying exceptionally well.

A third try from St Alban’s cemented their win, giving the team a much-needed victory after what has been a tough season thus far. Flyhalf Druan Visagie kicked very well as he converted his third kick of the match.

St Alban’s will be happy with the result and will aim to build on this as they look ahead towards their last few games of the season.

Although the first XV result did not go in the way of the visiting team, looking at the rest of the results in the other age groups, Northcliff can be proud of the number of matches won. It gives the first XV coach Tinus Diedricks much to look forward to in the future as he looks to build sides which can compete with the bigger schools.

Scorers:

St Alban’s College 21 (14) – Tries: Luke Webber (3).

Conversions: Druan Visagie (3).

Northcliff High School 15 (0) – Tries: Jordan Swanepoel, Tyler Goosen.

Conversion: Dylan Venter Penalty: Dylan Venter

Teams:

St Alban’s College: 15 John-Joshua Steenkamp, 14 Michael Rider, 13 Tumelo Mohale, 12 Luke Sass, 11 Nkosi Malaza, 10 Druan Visage, 9 Joshua Verster, 8 Daniel Bouwer, 7 Matthew Price, 6 Patrick Weir, 5 Llyod Schneberger, 4 William Von Broembsen, 3 Craig Milne, 2 Luke Webber, 1 Cody Petersen.

Northcliff High School: 15 Dylan Fourie, 14 Ziyaad Bhyat, 13 Jordan Swanepoel, 12 Luke Roos, 11 Gerrit Muller, 10 Dylan Venter, 9 Zenovian Johnson, 8 Jaden Baillie, 7 Chad Matthews, 6 Ethan Hayes, 5 Peter Diesel, 4 Liam Alderson, 3 Mpummolelo Bhehbe, 2 Tshiamo Makobo, 1 Blake Neale.

Results:

u19A: St Alban’s College 21, Northcliff 15

u16A: St Alban’s College 15, Northcliff 26

u15A: St Alban’s College 3, Northcliff 20

u14A: St Alban’s College 0, Northcliff 22