Pat's Perspective on the Aberavon game.

29th December 2009

PAT'S PERSPECTIVE

What a tremendous Boxing Day game against Aberavon. The spoils went to us 36-33 but it was a fantastic holiday fixture with a great atmosphere from both sets of fans and top-class entertainment.

There were too many mistakes to really satisfy either coaching team but 4 tries each made for great viewing and the game as a whole fully vindicated both clubs' stance on keeping this fixture in its proper place in the rugby calendar.

We'll be taking a close look at the tape of the game this week to rectify some of the areas where we did not achieve what we wanted and where decisions went against us.

I said after the Llandovery game that we are up against it at the moment with the number of injuries we had so it was good to get a couple back.

While I don't normally single out individuals, Martin Jones was crucial to our victory as the strength of our scrum led to two penalty tries and Tom Smith's last effort. Aberavon had a lot of Ospreys, we had only three but what quality ! Kristian Phillips got his 12th try of the season for us and Tom and Steve Tandy were superb.

Our tight-knit squad of players is working hard for each other and it is great to go into 2010 as League leaders.

Now we've got to get our heads right for the visit of Pontypool on Saturday - they have had their last two games postponed so will be raring to go and with our old fly-half Shaun Connor behind their strong pack we'll have our work cut out.

Hopefully, all those supporters who enjoyed the Aberavon game will have seen enough to come back again. So see you at The Gnoll on Saturday (kick off 2.30pm) and have a Happy New Year.

Pat