By Roth Admin
February 26 2005

Rotherham disappointed as they crashed 20-13 at home to Coventry, it brought about their 3rd home league defeat of the season. Although matching Coventry in the first half, the visitors totally dominated the second half, running in three tries to one for a fully deserved victory. Post Match Andy Northey said, “We struggled with set piece ball in the second half, at which point you’re going to struggle in the game. Therefore we didn’t have enough ball and Coventry capitalised on that. Credit to Coventry – Their set piece was good, they kept ball for long periods and Rotherham never touched the ball.

“When the opposition has the ball for long periods, then defending is tough. We put a lot into the first half – turned around and didn’t have a lot of ball and suffered. I thought we defended very well, but ultimately you can’t do it for that length of time.

“However we are going to finish the season trying to amass as many points as possible. We won’t fall into the trap of just going through the motions. We are going to keep striving to put on a performance every week. The boys are committed to that; it’s just sometimes you’ll get beat by a better side on the day.”

Ex Roth legend and Coventry assistant coach Mike Umaga said his team had won because, “We had the will to win! Although to be fair to Rotherham, in the first half they were ahead in that department. So really we took a lead from them and although Clifton Lane is not an easy place to visit, we got what we came for and we are happy with that.”

When asked what was said in the dressing room at half time to make the difference to Coventry’s performance in the 2nd half, Umaga replied, “You wouldn’t be able to print it if I told you. But to be fair to the boys they knew themselves what they hadn’t done in the 1st half and it was up to them to put it right. They showed great character and I’m proud of them.”

Rotherham started the brighter and took the lead on 8 minutes through a Richard Hopkinson penalty after Coventry had handled in the ruck.

In a scrappy first half played in wet conditions, errors were aplenty from both sides. However Roth increased their advantage on 19 minutes from another Hopkinson penalty after Lee Blackett had been the victim of a high tackle.

Coventry nibbled at Roth lead on 26 minutes after referee Roberts penalised the home side for not rolling away at the ruck. Fly half Jon Higgins slotted the penalty from around 30 metres out to reduce the arrears to 3.

On the stroke of half time Hopkinson had the chance to increase Roth’s lead to 6 points, unfortunately for him he pushed his penalty attempt to the right of the posts and the teams left the field with Roth ahead 6-3.

Coventry came out firing straight away and should have scored just two minutes in, however Paul Jones threw a forward pass to Craig Richards and the try was disallowed. Four minutes later ex Roth back John Cannon broke through and instead of off-loading to two spare men on his outside he went into contact and the chance was gone.

On 51 minutes and under severe pressure Roth had a line out just 5 metres from their line. The line out was a mess and the ball arrived with Hendry Rheeders who ran virtually unopposed to score the first try of the game. Higgins missed the conversion.

As the game progressed all the action was played deep in the Rotherham half and the home side defended majestically and with huge commitment. Possibly a tuning point came on 69 minutes when Opeta Palepoi was given a yellow card for preventing quick release.

While Palepoi was off the field Coventry scored two tries to seal the victory. The first came on 75 minutes from Rich Siveter and the second coming from Richard Davies two minutes from time. Higgins converted the latter.

One minute into injury time Rotherham made their first real onslaught in Coventry’s half. Good work from the forwards enabled the ball to be worked left to Anthony Elliott on the wing. Elliott showed excellent pace as he cut back infield to feed Michael Wood who had run an intelligent line.

Once Wood had collected he galloped through the Coventry defence to touch down between the posts. Hopkinson converted to give Roth a losing bonus point for the second week running.



Roth Admin Man of the Match: Glen Kenworthy – tackled his heart out all afternoon.

Referee: A. Roberts (4)



Rotherham

15 Anthony Elliott, 14 Richard Hopkinson, 13 Peter Jorgensen, 12 Lee Blackett, 11 Michael Wood, 10 Tom Eaton, 9 Jacob Rauluni ©, 1 Jon Golding, 2 Richard Emms (Rice 77), 3 Rod Latham (Rainima 55) (Lynch 79), 4 Nathan Pike (Tuiavii 50), 5 Glen Kenworthy (Pendlebury 77), 6 Opeta Palepoi 7 Tu Tamarua, 8 Jannie Bornman

Replacements
16 Tom Rice, 17 Seru Rainima, 18 Brendan Lynch, 19 Des Tuiavii, 20 Jonathan Pendlebury, 21 Brendan Haami, 22 Gareth Morley


Coventry

15 Paul Jones, 14 Craig Richards, 13 Nik Witkowski, 12 John Cannon, 11 Pila Fifita, 10 John Higgins, 9 Shaun Perry, 1 Kisi Pulu, 2 Rich Protherough, 3 Adrian Olver (C), 4 James Percival, 5 Ben Gulliver, 6 Hendry Rheeders, 7 Henno Venter, 8 Dan Farani

Replacements

16 Richard Davies, 17 Llyr Lane, 18 Donovan Sanders, 19 Alex Gluth, 20 Rich Siveter, 21 Mike Buckingham, 22 David Campton