Bears win Final Warmup
Coventry Bears 28 London Skolars 22
New River Stadium
Saturday May 1st 3.30pm
A late Jordan Paga try sealed a 28-22 win for Coventry Bears in their final pre-season game against London Skolars on Saturday. Despite being 18-0 up midway through the first half, the Bears mistakes let the home side back into the game.
The Bears travelled to the New River Stadium without Ben Pointer, Liam Whelham and Brad Ho. On top of this Player/Assistant Coach Dave Scott stuck solely to coaching duties for the afternoon. This gave opportunities to several players to get valuable playing time including the impressive half back combination of Dan Coates and the lively Paga.
Reece Rance opened the scoring for the Bears before the match was even 5 minutes old as he was alert to pounce on a steepling kick from Paga which Skolars’ wing Charles Hammond couldn’t keep hold of.
The Bears kept up this early pressure as the game moved on, forcing three knock ons in quick succession. The Coventry defence was robust throughout the first half an hour which they made the most of with further tries to Dawson and Sherratt.
However the tide soon turned as half time approached with Skolars picking up a try thanks to a lapse in concentration from the Bears middle unit which left a large hole from a high Neil Thorman kick for Mike Greenhalgh to open the home side’s scoring.
This was followed just before halftime, when an optimistic high pass by Bears centre Matt Whelham was intercepted by Skolar’s Omari Caro 50m from the Bears line. As the one time ‘fastest man in Super League’ it was always going to be a tough ask for the Bears defence to catch the Jamacianinternational who soon dotted down for London’s secondscore, leaving the score 10-18 as the halftime hooter sounded.
As the second half began the bears initially struggled to get the ball out of their own 30’. However Kadeem Williams strong hit in defence saw the Bears regain possession. They soon ventured downfield and another tricky kick from Coates to the wing saw Hadley Freeman score what fans will hope is the first of many tries from the ‘Wizard of Cov’ this season.
Despite being two scores ahead, Coventry made more hard work for themselves spilling the ball in the exit set from the kickoff following Freeman’s try. Try as they might, the Bears defence couldn’t hold the experienced Lamont Bryan who barrelled through to score from 3m out. Skolars then appeared to be in the driving seat as Phil Lyon scored from his own kick to tie the game at 22 all with 15 minutes to go.
A robust talking to from Assistant Coach Dave Scott under the sticks gave the Bears the shake they needed and their defence went significantly up a gear in the sets that followed. It wasn’t long before the Bears were camped down the right end of the field and looked more threatening to the Skolars than they had for most of the second half.
Paga displayed a clever shimmy to send his marker the wrong way and darted through to score the game winning try. Coates added the extras to cap off a good afternoon with the boot from him having scored 4 goals from 5 attempts. This was combined with some intelligent kicking in general play which will make him one to watch in the games ahead.
Overall this will have been a decent test for the young Bears side as they look to hit the ground running once their season gets underway. There were mistakes however they can take confidence from some of the combinations formed in attack. The Skolars showed some determination to stay in the game and Coventry will be a more hardened squad as a result of this hit out.
The Bears begin their Betfred League 1 campaign against Barrow Raiders next Sunday 9th May.
Bears: Hill, Freeman, M Welham, Dawson, Rance, Paga, Coates, Ryan, Cullimore, Dunne, Charlton, Townsend, Sherratt. Subs: Bedford, Bedward, Sheridan, Chirnside, Dawes, Williams, Kaufman, Hamilton.
Tries- Rance 5’, Dawson 19’, Sherratt 27’, Freeman 55’, Paga 69’. Goals: Coates 4/5.