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54 maltatoday SUNDAY, 26 MARCH 2017 Sport RUGBY Overseas crush Kavallieri Swieqi Overseas .......... 36 Kavallieri ................... 0 PHIL GIBBS WITH playmaker Amanda Cas- sar sidelined with a shoulder injury, the odds favoured a full- strength Overseas team on a re- cent run of good form. Overseas won the toss and elected to re- ceive. From the kick off, the ball ran loose to Noemi Perez Corral, who scooped it up and powered straight through the Kavallieri defence, running 75 metres ahead of the chasing pack to touch down under the posts. Charlotte Evans Sultana con- verted for the extra points. This set the tone for the rest of the match and Overseas were soon on the attack again. Justine Zammit was caught with the ball from the kick off and gave away a penalty. Tessabelle Sultana Evans took the tap and flipped the ball to Sairita Cassar, who made ground before playing a neat one-two with T Sul- tana Evans and finishing the move with an angled run to score under the sticks. The conversion took the score to 14-0. Play restarted with the Overseas kick off being knocked on by the Kavallieri receiver, awarding the winning team a scrum. Claire Casha gathered the ball from the back of the scrum and sprinted to the try line unopposed. The conversion was missed. Kavalli- eri finally managed to leave their own half when Maria Spiteri ran a sweet loop move and blasted 50 metres down the right touchline before being bundled into touch. The two teams swapped lineouts for two crooked throws and the following scrum ended the half when the ball was knocked on. The teams left the pitch with the half time score 19-0 in Overseas favour. Overseas reasserted their domi- nance in the second half with a touch of good fortune. When their restart kick looked like it would not make the 10 metres line, Kav- allieri hesitated instead of playing safe and the ball rolled into play. Wendy Pace burst down the left wing to pick up and hotfoot it 40 metres to the try line before dab- bing down under the posts. The successful conversion took the score to 26-0. Kavallieri des- perately tried to launch an attack from the restart, but were penal- ised for offside after a promising run ended with a tackle and the ball bouncing loose. T Sultana Ev- ans tapped and drove the ball up the centre before being blocked. Cassar continued the move be- fore shifting the ball right to T Sultana Evans who drilled a per- fect pass to Pace. She broke the tackle by Jacqueline Richards and dived in to notch up her second try in the right corner. With the game out of sight, Overseas rubbed salt into their opponents' wounds when Kavallieri won a scrum against the head, but scrum half Spiteri was tackled illegally. From the penalty, the ball was shipped along the line, but the final pass to Richard was a shocker and ended up between her legs. Pace kicked the ball on and was taken out illegally by Richards as she was chasing the ball. Perez Corral, supporting well, tracked the loose ball to the line and dived on it to score her second and the final try of the game to leave Overseas easy winners by 36 unanswered points. A dispirited Kavallieri left the field with noth- ing but the final ignominy of a yel- low card for Richards. Star player – Tessabelle Sultana Evans Other results - Kavallieri 5, - Falcons 19. Falcons 12 - Over- seas 10 PHOTOGRAPHY BY JAKE GHIRLANDO Stompers continue positive run by defeating Kavallieri Stompers ................... 78 Kavallieri ................... 5 BRYAN CORLETT STOMPERS after their win over Overseas last week carried on their running style of Rugby to win over Kavallieri by 78 points to 5 in this Cisk Lager League competition. A Kavallieri team rebuilding af- ter the loss of many of their senior players over the last two seasons, were no match for a dominant Stompers team that used the ball in a free f lowing manner. With Richard Gum the play- maker at f lyhalf controlling the game and a forward pack that shoved Kavallieri off the ball at every scrum, it was front foot Rugby that had Kavallieri at times chasing shadows. Stompers in the first half played against the wind and kept the pressure on Kavallieri pinning them in their own territory for most of that time, scoring con- sistently with Nathan Gatt(2), Gum(10) Nicky Maylor(6) Jeremy Debattista(22) and Mathew Al- exander(14) all scoring tries, with Gum kicking four conversions to make the half time score 33-5. Kavallieri had scored in the fi- nal minutes of the half with Jean Pierre Zammit(8) crashing over at close range after his team had kept Stompers under pressure with a rolling maul from a lin- eout. Gatt had scored from a close en- counter near the line, Alexander coming off his wing scored from an inside ball from Camilleri(12) and Debattista with a charge down the middle of the field, it was fast and furious! Referee Sam Ramage started the second half and quickly Stomp- ers went on the attack scoring within a few minutes with Josef Azzopardi(14) charging down a Brendan Dalton(22) clearing kick and running it in under the posts from 30 metres out. Nathan Gatt(2) scored his sec- ond try and another from Jeremy Debattista(22) running straight from a Gum inside ball, with the conversions, the score had raced out to 55 to 5, with Kavallieri struggling to get any continu- ity in their game. Chris Zahra(9) and Jake Pace(10) were trying to release their outside backs but the onrushing Stomper's back- line shut down their options. Thomas Bugeja(19) had some strong carries and the Kavallieri forwards bashed away but with little reward for their efforts. There were some good indi- vidual plays, but it seemed they were not all on the same page re- garding the game plan. Kavallieri were tapping most penalties they received but there seemed to be a lack of communication as to what they were doing. They needed to play the phases and build, but instead lone runners were being isolated and the ball ripped off them or passes were going into Stomper's hands and not their team mate's. But they battled on and kept their heads up. Gary Hili intercepted a Kaval- lieri attacking pass and for a prop showed some good pace as he steamed downfield 50 metres, he was caught by Dalton but the ball was off loaded to Formosa(21) who scored, with his all team mates and supporters shouting to give it back to Hili to score for his fine effort! Chris Betts(15) who had moved into f lyhalf used his pace and swerve to score a fine try and Max Galea(9) grubbered a kick through for Gum to run onto and he scored out wide making the final score Sliema Stompers 78, Kavallieri 5. Men of the Match: Stompers: Richard Gum. Kavallieri: Jean Pierre Zammit. On pitch two in a free f lowing game Overseas defeated Falcons by 31 to 20, keeping their hopes alive for a playoff game against Stompers in the Cisk Lager League. PHOTOGRAPHY BY IAN STILON