St. Albert was kicking itself after Saturday’s loss to the Clansmen in second division men’s rugby.
With six minutes remaining in the titanic defensive struggle, second-half substitute Matt Jarvis motored almost three-quarters the length of the pitch down the left touchline to score a dramatic try under the posts to cut the Clan’s lead to a point.
On the conversion attempt from close range, Braedon Platten was unable to clear the crossbar while kicking into a swirling breeze for the go-ahead points.
The Clan maintained possession for the rest of the match in St. Albert’s end to win 13-12 at Airways Park.
“It sucks coming that close to winning and then losing by one,” said St. Albert prop Graham Noren. “When we get that close, and you’re right in front of the posts, all the pressure is on the kicker and to miss something like that is pretty tough on a team.”
After starting the match at outside centre, Platten was thrust into the unfamiliar kicking role as St. Albert’s third standoff of the afternoon because of injuries. The last time he kicked for points was early in the 2011 season.
“Even though we were up by one we still had faith he would miss,” said Justin Fralic, the Clan’s burly prop. “After that miss we just played hard to the end and came out with a W just barely, but it’s a W.”
The Clan led 6-0 at halftime on penalty kicks in the fifth minute from inside the 22-metre line and the 25th minute in front of the 40-metre line with a Clan player in the sin-bin.
“Our defence in the first half was pretty good to keep them to two penalty kicks,” Noren said.
Late in the first half St. Albert was unable to convert a thunderous romp by Nick Gies deep into Clan territory for points.
A few minutes later, a penalty stopped St. Albert outside the five-metre line.
The half ended with a penalty kick by Frank Lucas from inside the halfway line that fell short of the posts.
“The first half we were struggling a little but after that everybody did awesome,” said Fralic, 20.
In the 55th minute, Noren split the defensive line near midfield and kept going forward without any pressure from behind. The grizzled veteran covered lots of ground before attempting a chip and chase against the small defender in his path. The low projectile struck the Clan player, who was quickly bowled over by Noren and his teammates in pursuit of the ball. After couple of rucks, Liam Zahara cracked the try line. The conversion by Lucas put St. Albert up by one.
Noren, 28, was surprised by the wide-open space he had to work with during a rare long gallop with the ball.
“You hear everyone around you screaming and cheering for your team or the other team, and you’ve got to make a decision: should I try and run this guy over or should I try to pass and set something up for someone else. Luckily I had some support and tried a little chip kick. Obviously it didn’t work out so well but I assisted a guy in the end, so it’s nice to have a guy score off that big run,” said St. Albert’s top player during the team’s 1-2 start to the season.
Four minutes later, the Clan capped off a forward-dominated surge with a converted try to make it 13-7.
“We really put the pedal to the metal. We were bigger than them by far, and we just gave it to them in the pack,” Fralic said. “St. Albert had a hell of a game against us but at the end it was defence that did it for us.”
St. Albert was the stronger team in the second half but it didn’t show on the scoreboard.
“The game opened up in the second half and we played a lot better once we started doing more running rugby, which is what we’re used to,” Noren said. “It was pretty good team defence overall too, just a couple of lapses that kept it close.”
The Clan’s home-field advantage gave them that extra edge against their bitter rivals in the Edmonton Rugby Union.
“It’s always a good rivalry with St. Albert playing the Clan and for a lot of the young guys they’ve never been put in a situation where you come to hostile grounds like this,” Noren said. “I hope this is a big eye opener. When we have a team on the ropes we have to finish games like this.”
The next match is June 7 against the Pirates at 7 p.m. at the St. Albert Rugby Football Club.
