The match at Hamiltons on Saturday was a humdinger as the game ebbed and flowed with both teams fighting for every meter they gained.
Belhar took on our pack and managed to neutralize our threat off set phase attack which forced the players to really pull together as they realised that they were in a battle against a side sitting in the top half of the SLA log. Some early ill Discipline cost us as Belhar went ahead 3-0 with their Flyhalf Dennis Cox and full back Junaid Arendse not only kicking well for poles but driving us back with some thunderous touch finders.
We found our feet mid way through the first half, during this stanza evergreen Winger Terry Jacobs and Harlon Klaassen touched down to give us a 12-3 lead.
With momentum shifting in our favour we launched a great counter which saw Niel Cleghorn’s try scoring pass knocked on only to see Belhar sweep on this mistake, capitalize and dot down under our poles to make it 12-10 at the interval.
This proved t be a pivotal moment as Belhar emerged with a new found belief in the second half and gradually via the boot stretched their lead to 19-15 with 5 minutes to play.
We had a try turned down for a 50/50 forward pass and 2 yellow cards in the last 25 minutes which almost made the task at hand seem out of reach.
However, the resolve ,self belief , fitness and desire to win saw us play some great rugby which finally lead to stalwart Morgan Newman forcing his way over in the corner on the short side as we changed direction of our attack intelligently.
20-19 with the conversion to follow and up stepped Earl Lewis to slot to vital kick from the left hand touch line to give us the 3 point cushion 22-19.
Belhar now needed a try to win and as they launched a series of attacks in our 22, the discipline and defense shone as we propelled them backwards before finally hoofing the ball into touch to claim the vital victory and 4 points.
We were tested by a gallant Belhar side however we stood up and got the job done. We will take a lot from this performance as we need to iron out our errors and lift our game another notch to face high flying Tygerberg next weekend.
Tries:
Klaassen , Jacobs , Newman
Conversions:
Lewis (2)
Penalties:
Lewis
By Anton Moolman