Renegades win Semi-Final! But somehow still lose?!

In the first of the Nicol Shield semi-finals, an unusual set of events were about to unfold.....

Teachers started the game strongly, moving the ball fast and wide but Renegades manage to contain them, by the skin of their teeth in some instances!

The tide started to turn Renegades way as they out-muscled the Teachers up front with Del boy and Geoff putting in some big hits. Mikey ‘The Legend’ Williams should also take some credit here as he promised Geoff 2 Canadian Dollars for every tackle he made.

First PK knocked over a penalty. From the restart, the Renegades headed straight back to the Teachers 22 where after a series of dominant scrums Bennett controlled the ball well at No. 8 to score a try.

Next to score was Merle in his crocodile rugby shoes. Playing on the wing today, but using his ability to also play in the 2nd row, smashed over from close range. He seemed happy with his try but as nobody can understand the man from Sunderland, this was never confirmed.

It seemed like this game would be a cricket score as a few minutes later Robinho scored his 8th try of the season to make it 22-0.

Before halftime, Teachers struck back. As usual if their dangerous backline runners are not shut down they have the speed to run the length of the pitch. Their winger almost did this if it weren’t for a try saving tackle by Robinho on the tryline. Unfortunately, he also saw yellow for killing the ball.

With a man down Renegades were in disarray and Teachers scored 2 tries before half time making the score 22-12.

Prior to halftime Sam the Prod also booted McChins child in the head – nobody was sure whether it was to do with Brexit or an attempt to stop him giving away penalties at the ruck. As father of the year 2016, he thought this might provide sufficient motivation, but this was not to be.

In the second half, things started well for Renegades as Healy sneaked off the back of a maul to run 30 yards to score a try with PK converting making the score 29-12. With 20 minutes left the Renegades were in a seemingly comfortable position.

This is where things started to unravel. For some reason the referee started to penalise Renegades for aspects that previously both teams were getting away with. Renegades received two yellow cards in the last 20 minutes.

Shortly after the first card, Teachers scored a converted try off a blindingly obvious forward pass. With the referee slightly unsighted, he went to his touch judge who assured him it was definitely backwards, and that the 20 players between him and the ball did not obstruct his view. Amazingly, the same touch judge couldn’t award Merle his second try right in front of him 5 minutes earlier as there were a couple of player in the way.

In any case, with the score at 29-19 and 5 minutes left on the clock it was unlikely that Teachers would be able to score quickly enough to allow them sufficient time to go for the win.

After Renegades received their 2nd yellow of the half and some desperate defending Teachers scored a try in the corner and missing the conversion at the final whistle making the final score 29-24 to Renegades…….or so 99.9% of the people watching and playing the game thought.

Sadly, the one man who mattered was in the 0.1% as the referee had at some point awarded Teachers a phantom try. So according to him the score was actually 29-29 and extra time was imminent.

With the referee unwilling to discuss the score with the coaches until after extra time coupled with the knowledge that Renegades had won fair and square in full time, heads dropped and Teachers went on to win in extra time.

The aftermath of the game was a bitter pill to swallow. Whilst nobody enjoys losing the feeling is 10 times worse when you know you have won but for a clerical error.

All credit must go to Teachers who informed the union of the correct score line the following day and agreed to forfeit the game. This showed real integrity and must have been an equally bitter pill to swallow having battled through 100 minutes of rugby in a closely contested game. We as Renegades must ensure that should anything similar happen to us, we hold ourselves to the same level of integrity exhibited by Teachers RFC.

As the final score now stands, Renegades will face Police in the Nicol Shield Final next Saturday! (And if you see a Teacher in the bar, buy them a pint!)