Coach impressed by his new Raiders in opening friendly win
A handful of fresh faces turned out for Raiders on Saturday as they overcame Bracknell in the first of their two pre-season friendlies at Footes Lane.
The home side were 24-7 ahead at half-time before running out 50-24 winners in a run-out that pleased the Guernsey director of rugby Jordan Reynolds, who was able to see newcomers such as Josh Poullet, Jack Colborne, Brian Njomba, Nesta Nyamakazi and Martinas Dromantas in action.
‘It was always going to be a little bit of a mix-and-match without 11 of what you could class as starters from last season – we got a lot of new faces in today and some young guys who we wanted to get game time against Bracknell.
‘I thought we played really well in parts, and I thought defensively we were excellent, especially in the first part – in the first half I think we only missed one tackle.
‘This summer we have talked about if we want to reach the heights of the top six we have got to be defensively really strong and we’ve created some good pathway for that.’
Raiders step up their preparations for the new National Two East season when they face Rotherham at Footes Lane on Saturday 24 August.
‘I think we’ve got the making of something pretty good here at the moment,’ said Reynolds.
