Welcome to Unicorn Tales Issue # 5 - 10th May 2007, the official newsletter of the Melbourne Rugby Union Football Club. Presidents Report G’day Fellow Unicorns, Welcome back to another season of MRUFC Rugby - Yes Season 2007 has finally started! Although it was not one of our best starts to the season, I think we are all just glade the season has begun. A big thank you to everyone who came on down to Fawkner Park to cheer on the boys. Fawkner is our interim home ground until Orrong/Romanis is suitable to play on again, which the council is telling us will be the end of this month - so fingers crossed that actually happens. On a positive note it gives me great pleasure to announce our new major sponsors for this season. Our Pillar side will be known this season as the redmercury Melbourne Barbarians. 1st, 2nd and 3th Grade will be known as the ICS (International Cleaning) Melbourne Unicorns, and our colts will be known a the Clearview Melbourne Colts. It is fantastic to have these great major sponsors on board, their support and enthusiasm for our great club and game is greatly appreciated. We are at home again this weekend at Fawkner Park, from 12 noon so come on down and support the boys, and yes there will be a BBQ this weekend. See you all at the game, Jed Macartney This Weeks Games This weeks Senior Games are at Fawkner Park - Our temporary home ground until Orrong/Romanis is available. 1st Grade - ICS Melbourne Unicorns vs Northern @ 3.15pm 2nd Grade - ICS Melbourne Unicorns vs Northen @ 1.30pm 3rd Grade - ICS Melbourne Unicorns vs Wyndham City @ 12noon Colts - Clearview Melbourne Colts vs Harlequin @ 1.30pm This weeks Junior Games are at: Under 12's vs Power House at Fawkner Park @ 9.00am Under 10's - @ 9.45am - Southern RUFC - Riviera Park, Seaford (Southern Districts) M97:F10 Under 8's - @ 9.00am - Southern RUFC - Riviera Park, Seaford (Southern Districts) M97:F10 Around the Grounds from last weekend Pillar Cup: No Games player - Season starts 30th June. ICS 1st Grade: Melbourne University 28 (B.Croake, C. Sale, J. van Heerden, T. Gale tries J. van Heerden conv 2P) def Melbourne 18 (T.Mitchell, M. Anderson, D.Laing tries, T. Mitchell penalty) No full match report. ICS 2nd Grade: Melbourne 7 University 10 No full match report. ICS 3rd Grade: Melbourne 5 University 17 The season opener was also against Melb Uni who just happened to be last years reigning Premiers and also the team that knocked us out in a controversial manner in the Prelim final at Quinns. The match was a very dour affair and certainly not the most entertaining Rugby match due to way to much dropped ball and silly errors from both teams along with obviously shaking out the pre-season cobwebs. Melbourne enjoyed the bulk of possession in the first half however the backline failed to fire and every time a half chance would occur it would breakdown due to a poor option or pass and ended up going to ground or being turned over. The rain came midway through the half and this then led to the handling becoming increasingly worse from both teams with the only points scored in the first half coming at the 44th minute (yes we know there is only supposed to be 35mins a half in 3rds) after yet another a backline mistake led to the ball being kicked through from halfway and a failure to put bodies on the line and the ball, saw it continue to be kicked through soccer style until it was picked up by a 2nd rower who dived over in the corner to make the halftime score 0-5 to the bad guys.......well reffed Mr Merrington..."NOT". The rain left and then came back again this time heavier and of course the conditions became increasingly frustrating for everyone, halftime changes added some stability to the backline but we were still unable to capitalise on our opportunities and the Uni defence managed to hold us out as we attacked their line a number times without any joy. Uni managed to score next to the posts midway through the half from another of our mistakes and some woeful attempts at tackling and they were up 0-12, not to be outdone we answered back soon after with a soft try to a barnstorming seagull Matt King floating in the centres and we are back in the game at 5-12...this coming not long after the man mountain himself had made a charging run down our side of the field and looked to be in for sure until the smallest player in the Uni side came across in cover & lifted his leg in a tackle and drove him up & over the sideline just 10m from the scoreline much to the amusement of the lads on the bench. Uni went on to seal the win late in the match when their Grand Final hero from last year came on and managed to step 3 defenders with a huge left step to score under the posts and then be converted to give a final scoreline 5-19 to Uni, we were beaten but certainly not disgraced as we were well into the match for 95% of it and had it not been for our poor handling, regular turnovers and ridiculous errors the scoreline could have easily been reversed. We will certainly learn from the first game of the year and will be better for the hit out in the upcoming weeks as we know we will certainly improve from here. Mentions from the match include the bookends Kirmani & Kingy who both played their best games in a while and look much fitter for all their hard work in the pre-season with Kirmani's pick & drives a highlight. The Engine room of Matty, Olly & Deadly Deccles playing almost the entire game together due to no front row back-ups holding their own up front and Olly in particular running around like a good looking halfback diving on skidding wet balls all over the paddock at one stage after doing so picking it up and gaining another sidestepping 25m in probably the run of the day. Ebbsy tackled everything that moved & became a human speedhump at one point in the 2nd half making the tackle of the day on a 120kg Tongan bulldozer who had calf muscles the size of Boysey's thighs. In the backs the large buttocked one wearing our No.9 tried hard all day along with the Shrek (when he caught the ball) damaging & then Jiggsy & Humph adding some sting in the 2nd half. 3pts Olly "Juggernaut" Garside, 2pts Ciaran "Ebbsy" Ebbs & 1pt Kirmani Nduati. Plenty of positives to look forward to in the upcoming matches with this week being a big test against what I see as being the benchmark team and probably the redhot favourites in 3rd grade the Wyndham City Rhino's down at Fawkner Park at 12noon & a big thankyou to all those supporters who braved the conditions last Saturday to come cheer the Rowzy's on and we hope to see you all again this week. Go Unicorns. Gilly. Clearview Colts: Melbourne 3 University 15 No full match report. Under 12's The Team arrived at Fawlkner Park after a limited pre season keen to get into the first Match of the year. We had sixteen players so it was unfortunate that Eltham could only field eleven. So we decided to rotate 5 players through the bench, rather than disappoint some boys by asking them to play for the opposition. After a slow start by our forwards we soon gained dominance over the Eltham team. Billy Meredith made some crunching tackles and Campbell Norton got his back-line moving well with some long, accurate passes from the base of the scrum. This allowed our outside backs to run wide and fast and we soon had a substantial score on the board with tries to Nick Clampett, Ben Kennedy and Nick Biggs. Fergus Brown showed good vision creating space and opportunities for his team mates. At half time we emphasised the need to keep our team systems and not be tempted by individual glory. The boys listened and played a more controlled and structured game in the second half. Three tighthead scrums, improved clean outs at the ruck and maul, and great support play from the backs brought rewards and a comprehensive 37-0 win. It’s a great start but the boys should realise that there are much tougher tests ahead and there are many areas to work on. See you all at training! Mark Chew and Peter Leahy. (Joint Coaches) Under 10's Great "official" start to the season by the mighty U10 Unicorns, with another convincing win, this time scoring 6 tries to 2 against Northern. The boys are playing with allot more structure & cohesion evidenced by this positive result and that of two weeks ago when they scored 11 tries to 1 against Eltham. We welcome the three Melton Boys and look forward to them being long standing Melbourne Unicorns. The try scorers on Saturday were Hutch 2, Ben 1, Hastings 2 and Matt 1. It was great to see all the boys making an effort, particularly the smaller boys with their tackling and commitment at the break down- let's not forget that they U10's, at times we expect them to play like seniors, it's daunting for a ten year old to "lunge" at an on-coming opponent, particularly when the opponent is twice their size & weight! Special thanks to all you parents that make the "journey" each Saturday morning, it only gets more difficult as the weather gets colder & wetter, so hang in there. We would also like to encourage you all to try to get the boys to training, we had 9 boys at training on Thursday evening and 16 boys at the match on Saturday! If transportation is an issue please feel free to contact Katrina and we will endeavour to assist. Also I noticed that several boys were playing with metal studs on Saturday morning, please note that these are not acceptable and if an official checks their boots pre-match we will have an issue; the club has several "used" boots in the swop shop, please liaise with Katrina. Finally, we have training on this Thursday at 5.15 and our next match is against Endeavour Hills (Black) at Riviera Park in Seaford (M97:F10), kick off is at 9.45am, please try to have the boys there by no later than 9.15am. The Coach. Under 8's No full match report.