Morgan dismissal mars confident Guernsey win

Romsey 16, Guernsey 29

THE sending off of Matthew Morgan in the dying seconds of the game marred another excellent away result for the Guernsey Rugby Club. The big Welsh back-rower was shown a red card for a high tackle and coach Rob Box felt that it was a very harsh decision but it summed up the referee's display.

'From what I saw and having spoken to the Romsey coach, yes it was a high tackle, but there was no intent in it at all. We will wait for the referee's report then decide whether we are going to contest it,' Box said.

'Unfortunately the game was not as good as it should have been. It has always been a passionate, hard battle when Guernsey play Romsey but the referee did not allow either side to play rugby and both teams just got frustrated.

'He has refereed us before in Hampshire One and he was fantastic then. I just think he had a bad day at the office.'

The referee also dished out two yellow cards as both sides lost a prop to the sin-bin for 10 minutes.

It was a disappointing end to the day for Morgan as earlier he had led the way with two of Guernsey's five tries.

Barry Goude, Dewald van Wyk and Andy Bailey also crossed the line while fly-half van Wyk added two conversions.

On another positive note, both Paul Thomas and Dave McGall came through their late fitness scares to take their places in the front row where they were joined by Gareth Nicolle, who made an impressive debut.

'It was a scrappy game and the weather conditions did not help. It was drizzling and it made the ball like a bar of soap so there were a few handling errors,' said Box.

'But from the first whistle we never really looked like losing the game and that seems to be the way it is every week.

'I cannot suss out this league yet because Old Amplefordians, the team we beat first, only just lost away to Southampton by one point this weekend and there have been some other strange results.

'But we only worry about what we are doing, not what anyone else is doing, and we have had two wins before our first home game. We could not have had a better start,' he added.

Guernsey play their first home fixture in London four South-West on Saturday when Old Paulines are the visitors to Foote's Lane.