GAME WEEK 5 REVIEW - BLUES DOMINANT IN WINS; ORANGE INJURY WOES PERSIST

Gameweek 5; the penultimate game week in the 2021 season.

The Gators Blue headed to Cardiff to face off against the Cardiff Bay Coyotes and Hurricanes 2 teams whilst the Oranges headed to Swansea and faced off against the Hammerheads and Gwent Trojans.

The Blues first matchup was against the Coyotes, who were coming off their first win of the season in a 38-6 beating of H2.

The Blues, led by Club Captain Mark Studley, put in a quality performance, beating the buoyed Coyotes 39 to 7.

Up next were the Hurricanes 2 and the Blues did not ease up, beating the H2 team 44 to 13

Blues Quarterback Liam Giles had a career day, totaling 12 touchdowns across the 2 games.

The Giles to Coetsee connection was on point, with Jan catching 7 touchdowns and the Defense was predatory all day, with Dan Davies especially, racking up 7 interceptions on the day.

This tees the Blues up nicely for the last game-week, where they enter with a 5 win, 5 loss record and with the Oranges and Hurricanes to face, they will be fancying themselves to finish with a .500 record.

The Orange squad, again decimated with injuries and missing personnel, took 7 players to Swansea. During the first defensive drive against the Hammerheads, they lost Tom Harrison to an aggravation of a prior injury and 2 drives later saw young starlet Jake Williams tweak his groin and limit his involvement going forward.

All this aside, the Oranges played determinedly; keeping the high powered Hammerhead Offense to a first half score of 21-12 with Dean Jackson to Matt Bourke largely the entirety of the Oranges offense whilst also subbing in on Defense too. The 2nd half saw the Oranges start to flag, not before a Beast mode-esque run by Jordan Madden, going almost the length of the field avoiding tackles before being tackled short and with Swansea rotating in some of their backups, the Hammerheads turned the screw a little, seeing the final score 45-24 to Swansea.

The Oranges were back on immediately against the Trojans and started spiritedly, opening the scoring with a Dale Davies to Bourke pass. The Trojans responded and the next drive saw Jackson, on 4th down, tackled centimetres short of the goal line. The Trojans also failed to score and the next drive Davies connected with Madden for another score, again the lack of extra point conversions the bane of the Orange team.

It was 12-6 when a nasty collision between Oranges Matt Bourke and the Trojans ever talented Safety Richard Harris occurred, leaving the former relatively unscathed physically but emotionally a little shook up and the latter with a broken nose and likely a concussion. Richard and some of his teammates spirited him off to hospital (Ed. Richard is fine now, except for some additional character to his face) and left the Trojans with a bare 5. After a 20-30 minute stoppage, the Trojans elected to continue the game and to their credit drew level and took the lead going into the half 13-12.

The 2nd half couldn’t have started any better for the Trojans, nor any worse for the Oranges as a Jackson pass was jumped by Trojan Ross Thomas, who returned it for a Pick 6.

The Orange offense then decided to go into hibernation for a large part of the 2nd half, with poor snaps and dropped snaps stalling the offense. The Trojans continued to score however and with 4 minutes left, the Orange O finally sparked into life.

After some QB trickeration, with a Davies to Jackson to Davies passing behind the Line of Scrimmage, Davies found Bourke with a deep left corner pass to the end zone that saw him reel it in with a textbook foot drag.

The Defense stopped Trojans final O drive and with the dying minute of the game, another Davies to Jackson but this time Jackson firing into the end zone to Bourke again, who would score 6 Touchdowns on the day, for the score. With essentially the last play of the game the Oranges went for a 2 pt conversion and Davies, who rolled right, found, you guessed it, Bourke again for the extra points.

The Game finished 45-26 to the Trojans and credit to them battling on after the injury to Harris.

This leaves the Oranges with a 3 and 7 record and with the derby against the Blues this coming weekend along with the final season game against H2, they will be hoping to bring some modicum of respectability to their record.

Bring on the final game week.

Bring on the Derby!

#BleedBlue

MVGs

MVGs for the week were;

Orange O MVG - WR Matt Bourke

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