Having lost their first match of the St Stithians Easter rugby festival on April 17, Northcliff High school (NHS) has proven why their nickname is the Bears, having clawed their own path of redemption against St John’s College, Harare on April 19.
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St John’s opened the scoring with converted a try in the first minutes of the match to take the score to 7-0. A perfect response from the Bears was a try from fly half Caleb Sokolich with Matthew Hunt converting to level the scores.
After that it was a flurry of responses from both teams.
Left wing of St John’s, Lee Chigumba hit back with another big try to make 7-14, however Northcliff had a reply of their own, by scoring a try and conversion to level the match to 14-14.
NHS took the lead for the first time when forward Troy Geyer scored a try, which was converted to give a seven-point lead (21-14).
With momentum gained NHS were ruthless on the attack with Hunt scoring a try and making the conversion to extend the gap to 28-14 just before halftime.
Northcliff started the second on a high scoring two consecutive tries making the scoreboard a one-sided affair with 42-14. They were just relentless on the attack and not letting up, with right centre, Kyle Sher extending the score to 47-14, making the boys from Harare’s tasks even harder with a 33-point deficit staring them in the face.
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The final nail in the coffin came left lock Declan Diesel who took the score up to 54-14 after the conversion. St John’s showing resilience and a no-die spirit scoring a late try to make it 54-19. The Bears improved massively from their first loss on Thursday against St Andrew’s College.
Coach of Northcliff High, Darren Jordaan stated that they cut out the areas that made them lose on Thursday and improved a lot. “I think the biggest strengths with this team is that we got the talent. We cut the areas out and we played some good rugby today.”
Jordaan highlighted that they made St John’s pay in defence and was happy with his team’s performance in racking up a win.
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