RNRL New Zealand Tour 2010 - Match 2 RNRL 12:20 RAN

. Australian Aboriginal Broadcasting Company ‘Barefoot TV’ had sent over a crew to cover the match and in another case of ‘It's a small world isn’t it’ the team had as its front man Tony Currie a former NZ RL Star and Head coach of the fledgling London Bronco’s in the late 90’s. Tony Curries link to the Brothers goes back to the early days of RNRL when Tony travelled down to Fareham to help Wayne Okell and Gareth Hughes with coaching the original brothers prior to the first ever match against the BARLA U-23 side. Following the official media ‘stuff’ Currie joined the Brothers in the changing room to pass on a few words of advice and encouragement to the RN players. Following Curries words skipper for the day Lee Rossiter gave an emotionally charged motivational brief to his team as they prepared to enter the arena and do battle with the old foes the Aussies.
With the ground underfoot very soft and the threat of further rain before full time looming the two teams took the field for the national anthems, once again the brothers won the singing competition by a country mile. The referee signalled the start of the real business of the day and the teams locked horns for the first time since 2007. The game remained even for the first 15 minutes or so as both teams strived to get the first points on the board. On balance the Aussies had the better of the early exchanges as the Brother struggled to execute their sets and force the repeat sets. Frustratingly RNRL showed in patches that they were a match for the Aussies but could not build enough momentum to get some points on the board. Eventually the Aussies did break the line, Daniel Struber going over close enough to the posts to make the conversion straight forward enough for scrum half Luke Woodcraft. RNRL continued to defend well against the powerful Aussie side but again gave away too many penalties and surrendered too much possession to be able to get some consistency to their play and in turn exert some sustained pressure on the opposition line. The Aussies now pressed home their advantage scoring again after 20 minutes this time hooker Bobbie Ashman crossed to touchdown with Woodcraft again slotting over the extras. Despite the pressure from the opposition the Brothers held the line holding up two try scoring efforts restricting the RAN to just the two converted scores. The brightest moment for RN of the half gave the team a much needed boost, on the last tackle the RAN put out a kick from midfield to the RN left, as the kick came down RN wing Aaron Hunt beat everyone snatching the ball from the air before beating the entire RAN cover in an epic 90 length of field sprint to touch down and post he first RN points of the game. Although Kev Botwood could not convert the try this was just the lift the Brothers needed and for the rest of the first half they gained in confidence pressing for another score which unfortunately did not come, so at the break the Aussies were ahead 12:4. From the restart RN were on the offensive straight away forcing errors from the RAN defence who responded with some desperate defence to prevent RN from closing the gap. 15 minutes in however and perhaps against the run of play the RAN side scored again, Chris Ison-Hastings scoring out wide, this time the distance was too much this time for Wooodcroft to convert -16:4. The second half saw a different Brothers side to the first; this was exemplified by the best possible response to the Aussies latest score. John Humphrey took advantage of a poor Aussie response to a quality midfield kick from stand-off Ade Peel, gathering the ball on the 20 metre line to skin the Aussie cover and touchdown in the corner closing the gap to just eight points. With the RAN on the ropes and almost from the restart Dave Gee made great yards from Kev Botwood's kick through and from the next play the ball Botwood delivered straight to Gareth Cadmore who took the ball over the line despite the attention of four Aussie defenders so, as if there was any doubt, it was now most certainly game on. Despite losing several players to injury the last 15 minutes were played at a frantic pace, the Aussies defending for their lives as the Brother piled on the pressure. For all their hard work however the Brothers could not find the crucial breakthrough and on the stroke of full time Ed Smith snatched a final score for the Aussies to give the final score to the RAN by 20-12. Despite a below par first half performance RNRL should be proud of their response in the second half, the penalty count was negligible compared to the first and with the RN pack more than matching their Aussie counterparts this young Brothers side should take great heart from their overall performance. At the after match formalities The Aussies awarded their RN Man Of The Match to RN No 11 Gareth Cadmore who received his award from All Blacks legend Stacey Jones who had taken part in a local league match after the RAN v RN clash.
Adam McCrohan, John Humphrey, Mike Haldenby, Silivenuisi Buinimasi, Aaron Hunt, Ade Peel, Kev Botwood, Lee Rossiter, Johnny Platt, Ritchie Metcalfe, Gareth Cadmore, Dave Gee, Ben Taylor,
Bench- , Alex Scruton, Wata Robanakadavu, Mark Robinson, Tommy Wilkinson.
Scorers; Trys- Aaron Hunt, John Humphrey, Gareth Cadmore