CHESTER ROMANS 6 MANCHESTER TITANS 42

Sunday 11^th July 2010, Chester Rugby Club

The Manchester Titans came to Chester on Sunday defending a 2 year undefeated regular season record, the Chester Romans were defending an undefeated home record this season, the Titans went away with their record still intact.

The day will not be remembered for the football though, there was a long delay when Romans Head Coach, Alan Winters was taken ill during the game and was taken by ambulance to hospital

Everyone at the club and I’m sure, all reading this wish him a speedy recovery back to health.

The game began with Manchester in possession and they moved the ball well and seemed poised to score with the ball on the Chester 3 yard line but Roman's Defensive Captain, Dave Goodall tipped QB Alan Mead’s pass into the air, caught it and raced 41 yards up the field. Chester couldn’t convert on a 4^th down on the ensuing possession and so the Titans took over on their own 26 yard line, this time there were no errors and Mead connected with huge Tight End Chris Heap for a 30 yard touchdown, the receiver using his size to his advantage and taking it in for a 6-0 lead. The extra point attempt was fumbled and again Dave Goodall scooped the ball up for the Romans and charged down the field, this time gaining 25 yards before being pulled down.

The 2 teams then twice exchanged drives again, Chester couldn’t convert on Fourth Down and turned the ball over to Manchester on the Titans 33 yard line, it took just one play for Mead to find the defence napping in the backfield and his 57 yard pass made it 14-0 with the 2 point conversion.  This sparked Chester to life and following great running from James Tootle a 58 yard drive was capped with a 27 yard Touchdown pass from Romans QB Richard Chudyk-Williams to Wide Receiver Michael Banks, the touchdown wasn’t converted but at 14-6, the Romans were back in the game. The game remained tight until right before the end of the 2^nd Quarter, when Manchester scored to make it 21-6 at the half.

The second half was not so close, the Titans scored an early touchdown to make it 27-6 and it was shortly after that the game was stopped due to Romans Head Coach Alan Winters requiring medical attention. There was a long delay before the game restarted and the event seemed to rock the Romans, 27-6 soon became 35-6 before the 3^rd quarter finished and towards the end of the 4^th quarter the Titans scored their final touchdown to make it 42-6. The Titans, despite leading by 36 points and having the game in the bag, never let up and were still intent on scoring more, with 47 seconds left on the clock they called a timeout in order to lay one last assault on the Roman End Zone only to be thwarted by returning Roman and last line of defence, Nadgy Khirat, who had an excellent game recording 11 solo tackles, many of which where he was the last man standing between the Titans and the Romans End Zone.

It was a game The Romans would like to forget for many reasons and hope to get back to winning ways now when they play 4 games back to back starting with Shropshire away on 25^th July. The Romans had some good individual performances on the day but need to perform better as a team if they still want to make the playoffs.

Report by Simon Taylor