Match report by Ed Bawden

Redruth were well beaten by a lively Hertford side who ran in five tries at Hoe Lane.

In a game where two players from each side were shown yellow cards in the second half, though Hertford played well Redruth will be disappointed by a disjointed display, in addition to the loss of giant lock Damien Cook with a back injury at half time.

Redruth kicked off into a strong wind and the home side’s Rob Richardson was wide with a long range penalty in the second minute.

After Danny Clackworthy was penalised for dithering over a line out throw Hertford took the lead from the quickly taken free kick, with fly half Olly Forrest dancing through the Reds defence to touchdown under the crossbar for Richardson to convert after 6 minutes.

The Cornishmen dominated the next 10 minutes, Aaron Penberthy put over a 40 metre penalty following an obstruction, and a series of dominant Redruth scrums on the Hertford line ended with Tom Duncan driving over for his 8th try of the season after 15 minutes that Penberthy converted. Hertford packed the fringe defence and took their luck to prevent further scores.

Two tries in the space of two minutes by Mike Allen turned the game on its head: his first effort on 25 minutes came with the referee playing advantage and was converted by Richardson, then from the restart a mix up between Craig Bonds and Lewis Vinnicombe saw the ball go loose; while the Reds hesitated Hertford cashed in to run in an unconverted try from the half way line.

Hertford had the better of play leading up to half time. Forrest, who moved to scrum half, had a good game while Brett McNamee and Lewis Hett were a constant thorn in the Reds side and a patient series of rolling mauls ended with Rob Schillaci going over for the bonus point try that Richardson converted to send the home team into the break with a 26-10 lead.

In a lively start to the second half Hertford had a try disallowed for a forward pass while Reds’ Nathan Pedley had been on the field just a few moments when he was yellow carded for running in to join a fracas. While Pedley can have few complaints, the referee and touch judges despite a long conversation did not identify the instigators of the incident.

Richardson kicked the resulting penalty and referee Michael Cooper, recognising tempers were running high, yellow carded Kanwaijt Basra and Peter Joyce a few moments later after a scuffle at the next penalty.

19 year old Lewis Moyle who replace Cook at half time made a good impression on his Reds début, fighting for every loose ball and winning a couple of turnovers. Chris Fuca won a lot of line out ball, Joyce got through a mountain of work while Tom Notman ran strongly when given the chance.

Midway through the second half Fuca score a try following a line out near the Hertford line and as Redruth started to get into the game the home side’s McNamee was given a yellow card after giving the referee his opinion following a penalty to Redruth.

Further Redruth pressure saw Owen Hambly go over in the corner after 71 minutes, Penberthy putting over a superb conversion from the right hand touchline.

In 8 minutes of stoppage time Redruth, with a good run by Greg Goodfellow, came close to a fourth try but on the day Hertford were worthy winners.

Hertford
Tries: Allan 2, Forrest, Schallaci, Foster
Con: Richardson 3
Pen: Richardson
Yellow Cards: Basra. McNamee
R Richardson: I Crompton, J Storey (Capt), L Sloan, M Allan: O Forrest (S Lawerence 78), M Hankin (P Foster 26); K Basara (J Patton 64), A Walker (E Moss 63), R Schallaci, C South, L Hett, B McNamee, C Wilson, J Corcoran (A Leo 26, A Walker 70-78)

Redruth
Tries: Duncan, Fuca, Hambly
Con: Penberthy 2
Pen: Penberthy
Yellow cards: Pedley, Joyce
B Rule; L Vinnicombe (N Pedley 45), C Bonds (Capt), J Semmens (S Parsons 63), T Notman; A Penberthy, G Goodfellow; D Jacques, D Clackworthy (J Tresidder 63), P Joyce, D Cook (L Moyle h-t, C Williams 58-63), C Fuca, J Morgan, O Hambly, T Duncan

Ref Michael Cooper (RFU)

Latest 200 Club draw results – the most sociable way to win with Redruth!

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£50 Mr J Reed
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£50 Mr J Ball
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Questions begin at 8:30pm, 8th December. Teams of up to 5 people. Entry is only £2 per person!

Have you been naughty or nice this year?

Well, find out at the clubhouse this Christmas Eve as Father Christmas drops down the chimney (!) for an early appearance!

He’ll be checking whether he’s won this year’s all-important Supporters Club Christmas Draw, with the lucky numbers being picked at 11:30am to kick-start the merriment.

Father Christmas will then be landing in a pile of soot from 3pm with presents in tow, before warming his cockles in Hellfire corner before flying off to complete his rounds (he really should be in Japan and Korea at that time!)

Come along for a festive sing-along and pre-Santa party at the clubhouse this Christmas. The bar will be open as usual, and there’ll be FREE mince pies and cream for everyone!

Questions begin at 8:30pm. Teams of up to 5 people. Entry is only £2 per person!

Some reports in the media have been confusing about the effect the acquisition of the Frame UK Hospitality Suite has had on the Club’s finances.

We would like to clarify the situation. The building itself was a gift from Frame UK, it was constructed by volunteer labour under the leadership of Mark Bryant. The fittings were also donated so there was no cost to the Club. We are extremely grateful to all concerned for the addition of this wonderful facility at The Recreation Ground.

For insurance purposes the building has been valued at £80K. Last year’s annual accounts show this, quite correctly, as an asset. It must be borne in mind that we neither spent nor received this amount in cash. The year’s figures therefore show a profit of about £40K. Once the one off asset is taken into account the reality is that the Club operated at a loss of about £40K last year.

This, on top of losses reported in previous years, has made our cash flow situation extremely difficult. We have made cuts in expenditure of £87K for the coming year but these savings will take a while to work through. The situation is that, despite having a robust business plan moving forward, we are short of cash now. Once our bills are paid there is insufficient cash left to pay the players hence the setting up of the Players’ Fund, a separate pot of money to enable us to meet our commitments to the players, our greatest asset!

The fund will be administered by Derek Ladner to whom all donations and questions should be sent. The target for this fund has been set at £75K and we expect an announcement shortly on progress.

To date the players have received part payment of their September match fees with the October payment becoming due shortly.

Hopefully this statement will clear up any misunderstandings that members or the wider public may have been under on reading recent reports elsewhere.

A good result on Saturday especially after the heavy defeat the week previous. It has been a tough week for the players with lots of criticism being pushed their way. I was absolutely dumbfounded to hear some people questioning the players’ desire. People must understand that the majority of this squad have come through our Mini Junior ranks and all they have ever wanted is to play for Redruth! Anyway I am not letting that detract from a solid team effort on Saturday. Barnes came to play rugby and all credit to them for that. Greg Goodfellow scored a great individual try in the first half and was at his sniping best. The forwards were solid and Chris Fuca did a great job in the boiler room. Both Josh Morgan and Danny Clackworthy made their starting débuts and both played really well. There was also a fairly bizarre incident that happened at the start of the second half involving Aaron. Those of you who were there will of noted that he left the field after a couple of minutes with, what seemed at the time, to be blood pouring from a head wound. The doctor and the physio had a look at him but could not find where the blood was coming from. Aaron said he was not hurting anywhere and as the medics wiped away the “so called” blood it became apparent that it was either a blood capsule or plain red dye! How this happened I have no idea, nor does he, nor do any of the players. If anyone can throw any light on it please let me know …. I would appreciate it! The DVD shows nothing other than 1 actual incident of contact but there was no clash of heads or anything…. it really is a strange one!!

On Thursday evening gone, we held the Financial AGM and the accounts were accepted. After the meeting Roly Joseph came to me and told me or rather asked me why I left Jamie Roberts out of my Lions team last week. Well the truth is I completely overlooked him, a complete cock up if ever the was one. I have had more thought since then as well and I think I would change my back line to Rob Kearney, George North, Brian O’Driscoll, Jamie Roberts, Tommy Bowe, Rhys Priestland and Mike Phillips …..

Back to the Financial AGM and as you probably know we reported a profit of £40k: however, included in that is one extraordinary item which is the acquisition of the Frame Hospitality Suite valued at £80k. Simple maths will then tell you that the club actually made a loss of near to £40k last year (UPDATE: further clarification is available here). This in itself puts huge pressure on the club and the consequence of the matter is that we have now had to structure our debt repayment to ensure that our creditors are paid as a priority to everything else within the club. In short this means that our cash flow is under tremendous pressure and the job that Andy Gallie is doing in order to maintain a steady flow of account settlement is admirable. But as with all things certain areas of settlement have to go by the wayside and in this case its the players who are caught up in the dilemma. Whilst the situation, hopefully, will be retrievable the club is currently in a situation with the players of not being able to settle their full match fees. Part payment has been made for September and it is hoped that the remainder of that month will be settled very soon. The players have been brilliant and have bought into the rescue package that has been tabled and, under the astute guidance of Derek Ladner, the club has launched a Players Fund. The primary aim of this fund is to raise money to remunerate the players for the remainder of the season. The initial response has been encouraging but there is a long way to go. For further information on this please contact Derek or myself. If ever there was a time where you can help its now and the players deserve to be supported as they are the main asset of the club and it is also imperative that we maintain a good standard of rugby at the club to ensure our young players have something to aspire to.

Went to watch the Cornish Pirates yesterday in their game against Esher. The wind was howling to be honest and it made playing conditions very difficult to deal with. However, the Cornish Pirates came through and achieved a bonus point victory over their rivals and in doing so kept their poistion in the Top 3 of the Championship. Bristol are top the table after a great win on Friday night against London Welsh. Bedford also look to be one of the teams to beat this time out and they were very unlucky last year not too have knocked Worcester out in the semi final. It’s the first time I have been to the Mennaye to watch a league game and the main reason I went this time was to see Aaron get presented with his Trelawney’s Army Supporters Club Under 20′s Player of the Year Trophy. Aaron became the 3rd member of the current Pirates squad to have won this trophy with Ryan Westren and Paul Andrews going before. Other winners, from Redruth, in the past have been Nathan Pedley and Adam Lewarne.

I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to Wadebridge Camels for letting them down on Saturday when having to “cry off” at 10 o’clock on match day morning. The reason was genuine and we could not raise a side. On the Thursday night we had 16 players and then on Friday I have to withdraw Chris Bailey from the team to take a place on the 1st Team’s replacements bench. A further 3 “cry off’s” that day put us down to 12 and then 2 made themselves unavailable on Saturday morning. We tried to get players from Hayle and Redruth Albany but both had games. It was equally frustrating for us as there were players who desperately needed to play. Hopefully our position changes this week so we can fulfil fixtures.

Keeping in line with everyone else these days, you can follow me on Twitter …. its @DavePen8 … not to good at it yet but with practice I will get better …… I only have 31 followers at present so I need to get my numbers up to compete with all the whipper snappers at the club ….. help me????

So New Zealand are World Champions and I must say they deserve it! I thought for a minute or two that France were going to sneak it but the Black’s composure prevailed and they emerged with a single point victory! France were very good and were nothing like the side that looked totally naive in the group games. The bronze medal game was won by Australia but what a finish by Wales! 31 phases and a try try at the end of it typified what the Welsh are about these days, it was simply outstanding. They had a great World Cup and to come away with nothing was a travesty, as it is they return to Wales with nothing to show other than the admiration of the rugby world in respect of the way they went about their business of playing some outstanding rugby. However, there is one thing that I am gobsmacked about! I have just looked at the latest IRB rankings and I note that Wales have slipped from 6th to 8th! England remain in 5th place with New Zealand, Australia, France & South Africa above them in that order. In 6th place are Ireland with Argentina jumping to 7th. Bloody farcical!!!

Just reading on Google and I see the French have been fined £10,000 for encroaching on the Haka in yesterday’s final. There is a prescribed distance that you must keep and they didn’t! The report has appeared on the “Score” website but at the time of writing this nothing has appeared on the IRB site.

This Saturday we travel to Hertford, it’s a while since we have been there and that was back in 2004/2005 our promotion season. It’s another Friday night trek up to the Village Hotel Elstree for the boys and then a long trip back on Saturday night. For those of you who can’t join us, don’t forget about the Halloween party this Saturday at the clubhouse!

So that is it for this week, hopefully catch up with a few ex pats over the weekend and hopefully will see Phil Tiddy again as I know he lives in Hertford.

David Penberthy
Director of Rugby – Redruth RFC

Report by Roger Watson.

Two scintillating scores from scrum half Greg Goodfellow were at the heart of Redruth’s eight try mauling of a spirited Barnes.

Goodfellow and fly half Aaron Penberthy, in their first start together, ran the show for the Reds with their distribution, kicking from hand and well-timed breaks.

Indeed it was a well-judged kick from Penberthy which bounced kindly to be gathered by Brett Rule who opened up the Barnes defence to put Jamie Semmens over to open Redruth’s account after two minutes. Penberthy’s touch line conversion was the first of a perfect afternoon’s performance of eight from eight.

Barnes replied with a James Clark penalty but could not contain a rampant Redruth anxious to make amends for the heavy defeat at Richmond the previous week. The Reds were justly rewarded by tries from Chris Fuca and Lewis Vinnicombe. Barnes replied when, awarded a simple penalty, they opted for the scrum and quickly moved the ball wide for Luke Sayer to touch down, Clark adding the extras.

The highlight of the afternoon came on the half hour when Goodfellow went on a sniping thirty metre run to score one of the best tries seen at The Recreation Ground, securing the four try bonus point.

Notman added another before the break when, after pounding the visitors’ line Penberthy opted to ship the ball wide.

In a bizarre incident after the break Penberthy left the field with what appeared to be a nasty head wound. When cleaned up by the medics it became evident that there was no wound but that someone had burst a fake blood capsule on him so he was able to re-join the fray almost immediately.

Barnes then enjoyed their best period of the game culminating in David Butler touching down.

Fine tries from Goodfellow and Craig Bonds added to the Reds’ kicks tally with Butler crossing for his second for Barnes, converted by Gareth Williams-Davies.

Barnes pressed hard for a four try bonus point of their own but the home defence held firm. Fittingly Redruth had the last word when Tom Duncan went over for his seventh try of the season.

Reds’ Director of Rugby was pleased with the result but confirmed that there are still areas that need to be worked on before next week’s trip to Hertford.

“The boys were nervy before the start as they felt they had let themselves down last week but they put in one of our better performances today.”

Attendance: 680

Referee: Referee: Robert Warburton (RFU)

Redruth

Tries: J. Semmens 2, C. Fuca 8, L. Vinnicombe 21, G. Goodfellow 30, 51, T. Notman 34, C. Bonds 63, T. Duncan 77; Conversions: A. Penberthy 2, 9, 21, 30, 34, 50, 63, 77.

Barnes

Tries: L. Sayer 27, D. Butler 45, 68; Conversions: J. Clark 28, G. Williams-Davies 68; Penalty: J. Clark 5.

Redruth: B. Rule, L. Vinnicombe (N. Pedley 59), S. Parsons (C. Bonds 49), J. Semmens, T. Notman, A. Penberthy (C. Bonds 42 – 44), G. Goodfellow, P. Joyce (Capt.) (D. Jacques 49), D. Clackworthy (R. Brown 59), C. Williams, D. Cook, C. Fuca (C. Bailey 55), J. Morgan, O. Hambly, T. Duncan.

Barnes: J. Clark (W. Gower 41), D. Butler, D. Riley, J. Hersey, L. Sayer, G. Williams-Davies, I. Moss (E. Godsall 53), J. Remfry (R. Matthews 53), E. Aliterac, J. Dawson (J. Remfry 70), N. Taylor, R. Dumbleton, G. Holmes (Capt.) (S. Givens 41), R. Beckett, S. Harding (T. McArthur 53).