RUGBY Lakenham and Hewett 19 Ely 19 A HALF-HEARTED and over-confident performance caused Ely Tigers to drop their first points of the season on Saturday. Ely found themselves 12-0 down after 16 minutes; the first try conceded in midfield to a very sloppi

RUGBY

Lakenham and Hewett 19 Ely 19

A HALF-HEARTED and over-confident performance caused Ely Tigers to drop their first points of the season on Saturday.

Ely found themselves 12-0 down after 16 minutes; the first try conceded in midfield to a very sloppily executed backs move by Lakenham and the second equally as culpable as Ely backed out of tackles.

Then, against the run of play, Ely won a penalty 15 metres from the opposition line, Lee Kupyn took it quickly and scored under the posts for Gavin Ross to convert to narrow the gap to 12-7.

This sparked the Tigers into life and, for the first time, decent ball was given to their backs, who responded by cutting the defence to pieces. Firstly Mark Goude, then Daniel Coulson, made ground, before Gavin Ross went through to score and level the scores, 12-12.

Ely's Gavin Ross started an incisive break from within his own half, played a one-two with Tom Jackson, before handing the ball to Lee Coulson to finish off and give them the lead.

The Tigers then switched off and the forwards became embroiled in close contact and the backs were starved of good ball.

The situation did not improve in the second half as Lakenham modified their tactics, keeping the ball close in contact, retaining possession, dominating the line-out and interspersing it all with long kicks and Ely were unable to cope.

Lakeham moved into the Ely 22-metre area and produced their best play of the game to score in the corner and bring the scores level at 19-19.

Ely then drove forward and won a scrum five metres from the line, virtually under the posts, but a private vendetta continued after the whistle and the decision was reversed to a clearing penalty to Lakenham. Ely kept up the pressure and missed a good penalty chance before the vendetta reappeared and Kupyn was yellow-carded. This essentially ruined any chance Ely had of taking the win.

Director of Ely Rugby Club Terry Moore said: "This was not a good performance, it was half-hearted and over-confident against a side which was competent only.

"The dangerous Ely backs did not have one good ball given to them in the whole second half and many poor situations were recovered by the excellent Daniel Coulson at scrum-half who had a superb game.