Sat 11 May 2024
Magnificent, motivated Kingsbridge clung on to clinch victory in the final of the Papa Johns Plate final. In a game that had just about everything, including a red card.
Kings overcame a classy Twickenham side, 36–28. Playing with heart and spirit, they would not be beaten by a side who were overcoming the shock of being 21 points down after 10 minutes. Even playing with fourteen men for the last 20 minutes didn’t faze Kings. And in one memorable moment, when all seemed against them, replacement winger Ashley Thuel produced the highlight of the game, a crunching tackle that poleaxed the Twickenham winger to such an extent that he lost control of the ball, allowing the indefatigable Stu Harris to pick up and score what turned out to be the winning try.
The whole Kings team played with such a will to win that no praise for them would be too high but, in Jack Winzer they had the man of the match. Captain Freddie Buckle kept his impressive run of form and, with Ben Newman shining at fly half, Kings were always in the game, although the Twickenham eight and three made life difficult for them.
The game started at a frantic pace as Kings piled on the pressure. A fine kick by Newman took them to the Twickenham line. A good break from Buckle set up a maul from which Dan Jarvis, another who impressed, was over for the first points. Newman coolly drop kicking the conversion whilst Kings were looking for his tee! Another Newman kick, after a scrum penalty, took Kings into the twenty-two. A good lineout saw scrum half Max Fergusson over as he made Twickenham pay for poor defensive work, racing through a gap. Newman adding the extras. Not content to take a rest for a couple of minutes, Kings applied more pressure resulting in centre Toby Baldry pouncing on a loose ball who kicked ahead to gather and score. Newman again adding the extra. Eventually Twickenham started to play some rugby, recovering from Kings blistering start. Led by their outstanding eight, Twickenham put together some attacks of their own. Their prop, who was playing more like a stand-off, conjured up some quick ball for Twickenham to score their first points. Now playing with some rhythm, Twickenham were pressing hard, almost scoring but denied by a try-saving tackle by Harris, they kept attacking and were soon on the board again. Back came Kings as another break by Ferguson down the blind side made yards, with Tom Winzer there to take the scoring pass. Newman adding the extra with a wonderful touchline conversion to leave the half time score 28–14.
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