IN winning by one point out of 51, 26-25 at Newlands Road in Luton, Jersey RFC might count themselves lucky but, according to coach Ben Harvey, not a bit of it.

‘For most of the game we were dominant,’ he said. ‘They scored their last try in the fourth minute of injury-time when the referee’d already said two minutes before that he was about to blow up. At times we murdered them’ and – Harvey was virtually purring as he remembered this moment – ‘our second try was the best team try we’ve scored all season.

‘At the start of the second-half they kicked off; the ball didn’t go 10m and, from the scrum, the ball went through nine phases of play before Sam (Tuia) stepped the last defender to score. For one of the first times this season the lads stuck to the patterns of play we’d practised which, as a coach, is exactly what you want them to do.
‘Le Bourgeois converted that and, to be fair to the lad, he struck the ball beautifully all day. I don’t think the game was ever in doubt, despite the scoreline.’

With Shelford and Barnes both winning comfortably, Jersey remain third in London I, but Luton’s director of rugby, Denis Ormesher, maintains there are only four teams in it for promotion; Shelford (almost certainly) and then any one of Barnes, Jersey, Luton and Hertford in a dogfight for second-place, which wouldn’t guarantee promotion but would mean a play-off for National II.

• Picture: Sam Tuia finished off Jersey’s best team try of the season on Saturday, while Michael Le Bourgeois, right, chipped in with 18 of the Rugby Club’s points away to Luton