Fixture

The Youth maintained their 100% record in the league with a bonus point win over one of their closest rivals as they came up through mini and junior rugby.  They also continue to be the meanest defence in ALL of the youth leagues throughout the entire country.  They have conceded just 27 points (only 2 trys) in their 6 league fixtures.

Despite Newbridge dominating the opening exchanges a couple of indiscretions cost them and the scoring was opened by Laurie Baldwin for St Julians with a 35m penalty.  However, from the restart Newbridge took control and ended up with an attacking 5m scrum.  St Julians would be bettered throughout the game by the Dragons U18 front row of Nathan Evans, Zach Hewlett and Taylor Hansen and at this scrum the pack allowed number 8 Garin Price to Pick up and smash his way over as shown in the photo above. Iwan Burgwin converted.

From the restart the ball was well marshalled and fed out along the line to Garin who again broke 2 tackles and then showed his pace to race 60 plus metres to cross for his second.  Iwan once again knocked over the extras.

Once again a couple of penalties brought Baldwin into kicking range and he converted one of them to make the score 14-6.   Scrum half Zach Morgan playing his 3^rd game in 4 days was having a stormer delivering flowing ball to Burgwin, dragging down the bigger forwards and sweeping superbly behind to catch a number of chips and set up quality ball.

Newbridge went into the corner and superbly controlled the driving lineout but Morgan Thomas was unlucky to be held up over the whitewash.  St Jules managed to pay one rare visit to the Newbridge half but the ball came loose to the mercurial Luke Shore at full back.  Luke cut back right on his own 10m line and was down the line before the opponents knew what was happening.  The inside pass to Garin was just before the 22 and the hat trick looked on.   However the defence reorganised to hold Garin who threw a long pass to centre Ethan Chess.  Ethan had been flying up the middle of the pitch but was now cutting a stunning angle completely against the grain.  This prevented any defenders laying a hand on him and from 10m out he sprinted 30m diagonally to dive in unopposed.  Another brief visit by St Julians into the Newbridge half allowed Baldwin to convert another penalty for their last points in the game.  21-9.

After a swift team talk, the Bridge returned to the field and immeadiately upped the tempo and looked after the ball much better. After some great phase play, Garin picked up from another 5m scrum to make sure of his hat-trick. During the interval, Luke moved onto the wing and Joel Witcombe was on at 15.  Burgwins backs, with the excellent Ethan and Ioan Lloyd in the centres, ran one of their trademark moves to allow speedster Luke to fly down the wing and then flick the ball to Joel to cross for a carbon copy of a try scored the previous week against Risca.

Possession was constant and the pacey forwards showed their excellent handling skills particularly George Price, Euan Lewis and Jack Littlejohns.  Blind side Jack scored the next try as prop Nathan showed what he can do over 30 metres and then provided a sublime out of the back one handed flick to the supporting Jack to run in the last 10.

The finale was left to rugby league international Garin to cut through the blindside and from 40m he outpaced the defence to cross for his fourth of the game and with Burgwin adding one more conversions the final score was a bonus point 43-9 win for The Youth.