Old Cooperians13 : 17 Diss - 24th January 2015

Match result Diss 17 Old Cooperians 13

Travelling to play relegation threatened Old Cooperians was always going to prove a difficult encounter for a confident and ambitious Diss outfit. In what proved to be a very fiesty and at times unpleasant encounter , Diss eventually came out on top due to yet another dominant performance from their entire set of forwards.

Old Cooperians had nothing to lose and played with a huge amount of passion and at times stretched Diss with an accomplished counter attacking game. On ten minutes Diss attacked from within their own half and lost possession in midfield , allowing Old Cooperians to move fast ball wide on the right to score an unconverted try to lead 5-0.

Diss responded immediately and began to string together a number of attacking phases close to to the breakdown that set up an attacking five metre scrum. Diss totally dominated this facet of the game all afternoon and rolled Old Cooperians over their own line allowing Captain, Fraser Hall, the opportunity to score.At five all the game now went through a very unsatisfactory period . Diss lost Paul Cayley with a yellow card for a line out offence and following a disgraceful attack on John Bergin , Charlie Crotty and an Old Cooperians player were also sin binned. As the half drew to a conclusion, Diss attacked wide on the right and released debutant Ewan Lawton , who stepped inside his defender to score and take Diss into a deserved half time lead.

Old Cooperians responded in a most positive fashion at the beginning of the second half and scored a well taken try to leave the scores level at ten all.The game now fluctauted from end to end , with Diss totally dominating the first phase aspects of the game . On twenty minutes Old Cooperians attacked on half way and following a dangerous tackle, Jamie Burroughs was shown a red card to reduce Diss to fourteen players for the second time in the match.This reverse did not however halt the Diss juggernaut , which now attacked Old Cooperians around the fringes at every opportunity. Following a loss of possession, Old Cooperians were awarded a penalty at a ruck which extended their lead to 13-10 with ten minutes remaining.

Diss reacted superbly with Man of the Match Ryan Carter leading the way. Charlie Crotty, Fraser Hall, Chris Craven and John Bergin all carried possession deep into the Old Cooperians half and following a ruthless rolling maul, Peter Bray crashed over to score the decisive try of the game. Jack Peacock stepped up to convert and Diss saw out the final eight minutes with consumate ease.

Paul Cochrane

Director of Rugby ( Diss RFC)