Teenage Tiziano Signs For T'Knights

Leicester Tigers 19 year old Italian prop Tiziano Pasquali has signed for Doncaster Knights on a short term loan deal.  The Knights have suffered a spate of injuries in the front row and Pasquali will provide cover on both sides of the scrum.

His debut in Men's Rugby came on Saturday when he replaced Colin Phillips at Tighthead for the final 25 minutes in their win against Loughborough Students at Castle Park.

Pasquali made his first start for the Tigers Extra Firsts in their recent win away to Worcester and will now look to push on and establish himself in promotion favourites Doncaster's front row.  Last season Kieran Brookes went on loan to Doncaster as they tried to stay in the Championship, hopefully this spell will work out better for all concerned.

Magnificent 7 go out on Loan

Seven Tigers are out on loan this weekend as the Championship takes a break for the British and Irish Cup.

Kieran Brookes and Andy Symons both pull on Doncaster colours for the second time this season as the Knights travel to face Llandovery.  

George Oliver could make his Rotherham debut as he is named on the bench for the visit of Munster A, who have Johne Murphy lining up on the wing.

Nottingham feature four Tigers as they welcome Melrose to Meadow Lane tonight.  Joe Cain makes his first start for the Green 'n' Whites at lock, whilst in the backline Andy Forsyth lines up at 12 and Alex Lewington plays on the wing.  Ryan Bower makes up the quartet as he takes his place on the bench.

Loan Rangers

Kieran Brookes, Jonny Harris and Alex Lewington are all in Championship action this weekend after being loaned out for game time following the end of the A league campaign.

Keiran Brookes moves from National League 1 Loughborough Students to second bottom Championship side Doncaster Knights, he'll make his debut at tighthead tonight against Moseley at Castle Park.  If he features for Tigers against Wasps when we miss 4 props to international duty he will have played in the top 3 tiers of English Rugby, all before Christmas!

Alex Lewington returns to his home city of Nottingham where he enjoyed a successful loan spell last season contributing 4 tries in 20 appearances.  He is joined by prop Jonny Harris who features on the bench as Notts head to Brickfields to face surprise package Plymouth Albion.  Jonny has played 21 games over the past 3 years for Notts on Dual Registration from Tigers.

A League seasons ends with victory

The official Aviva A League season is already over, just 7 weeks into the season, as Tigers Extras have failed to progress to the semi finals stage.  Gloucester beat Northampton to ensure both sides progressed at Kingsholm on Monday night.

In the last round of fixtures Tigers traveled to Sale with a strong side featuring both Deacon brothers and Matt Tait.  They romped to a 10 try 61-20 victory with a hat trick from burgeoning winger Alex Lewington and a brace from the impressive Irishman Michael Noone.  Other scores came from Andy Forsyth, Henry Purdy, Micky Young, Matt Tait and Pat Phibbs.  Matt Cornwell added 11 points with the boot.

Over the course of the 5 game season Tigers used 43 players, with 31 different starter, 9 have been involved in all 5 games but only 3 players (Matt Cornwell, Fraser Balmain and Alex Lewington) have started every game.  11 players have featured a single time, from Louis Deacon and George Chuter at one end of the spectrum to Tom Bellak and George Oliver at the other.

Top try scorer has been summer signing from Wasps Henry Purdy who has touched down 6 times in only 4 starts.  Alex Lewington scored 4 and Michael Noone scored 3.  Matt Cornwell notched 20 conversions from 31 attempts and was also succesful with 2 penalties for a grand total of 46 points.  Overall 17 players a scored a try and a penalty try was also scored when Alex Lewington was taken out with the line begging.

Tigers outscored their opponents 201 to 142 points over the 5 games, including winning the try battle 31 to 17.

This has been a mixed season for Tigers Extras.  They lost against the only 2 decent sides they faced but romped to massive victories against the weaklings in the group.  They looked pretty handy in the two home games I saw but the standard of the competition has collapsed from a high point of the mid noughties.  It used to be a better standard than the Championship but now resides somewhere around National League 1's mid table.  So it is very difficult where to place even the standout players like Henry Purdy, Alex Lewington or the two young props Fraser Balmain or Kieran Brookes.  Are they ready for the first team or not?  Who knows and with Cockerill's less than progressive use of the academy we may never find out.  It's definitely a grim life for the ones that struggle at this level.

Really the A league has evolved into a joke tournament.  England is a small country and a regional competition is unnecessary and makes the competition weaker.  It is frankly a shame that Tigers can't play the likes of Harlequins, Saracens or Exeter on a regular basis and instead have to schlep to Sale to put 61 points on a side that isn't fit for competition.  Last year we put 80 points on Leeds.  We could get games as uncompetitive as that by playing Nottingham, Moseley and Bedford and save a lot of money on diesel for the team bus.  Instead the A league should move to two national divisions of 6 with promotion and relegation between the divisions, and playing a full 10 game double round robin fixture list.  This could be supplemented with friendlies and local derbies as desired by the individual clubs.  What ever happens it can't, surely, stagger on with this ridicules micro schedule for much longer.

Loan Props taste defeat

Two Tigers were out on loan this weekend as Ryan Bower played the last 7 minutes for Nottingham, away to Bedford losing 27-25, whilst Kieran Brookes started at tighthead for Loughborough Students as they crashed to another defeat in National League 1 this time away to Coventry 41-34.

High Noone as Tigers tame flustered Falcons.

Michael Noone made a dream start to his Tigers career as he scored a scorching breakaway try on debut. After smart work from Scott Steele turned ball over from a Newcastle scrum Noone showed the Geordie pack a clean pair of heels as he outpaced the cover defence to touch down in the left hand corner.  As the saying goes No-one is perfect!

Tigers raced away to a 7 try win securing the bonus point after only 22 minutes, as a scintillating first half hour put the Tigers way beyond the grasp of the Newcastle side.

After the first try established the lead it was never lost, on 13 minutes after heavy pressure from the forwards the otherwise unimpressive Bowden danced through the Newcastle defence to touch down under the posts.   Cornwell added the extras to make it 12-3.

Newcastle did claw a try back and it was the least they deserved for a concerted if blunt forward effort eventually relented to allow the backs the ball. It was shifted right to left and Michael Tait scored in the corner.

The next try was scored by Adam Thompstone after very strong running from the impressive Alex Lewington.  His strength through contact is reminiscant of great wingers of the past like Dave Lougheed or Horacio Agulla. 

Lewington was creator again as opposite winger Henry Purdy barged over for the bonus point try.  On the wrap around Lewington barged past 5 defenders before releasing Purdy, who still had work to do himself beating the Newcastle hooker to the line.

Purdy bagged his brace just 5 minutes later as a solid scrum fronted up by former Newcastle Royal Grammar School-Boy Fraser Balmain and former Falcon Kieran Brookes allowed Tigers an attacking platform to work from.  Morris took the ball to the line before releasing Purdy, a summer signing from Wasps academy, who beat his man on the outside possibly benefitting from no TMO as he was rapidly approaching the touchline.

Milky Bar Kid look alike Joel Hodgson slotted a penalty to round off the half.

The start of the second half has been a good time for Leicester this season with the first team bagging tries in both games so far.  The A team didn’t want to be outdone and duly had their own fast start in front of most of the first team squad, plus Tigers legends John Wells, sitting next to Geordan Murphy, and Freddie Tuilagi in deep conversation with Dean Richards.  If a stack of Samoans turn up to Newcastle in the coming weeks we will know why!  Scott Steele took the ball from a quick ruck, shifting on the Dan Bowden.  Bowden threw a trademark wide miss pass, whether he is capable of passing under 15 metres is yet to be established, to Morris who drew in more defenders before Thompstone, playing 13, had a strong finish from 20 yards.  He was brought down on the line and it wasn’t immediately clear whether he or debutant Noone had got the score.  Thompstone was awarded it and thus sealed his brace for the night.

Newcastle then laid siege to the Tigers line thanks to some refereeing that wouldn’t have been out of place in an under 14s match, fittingly as the touch judge Rob Debney was my old school teacher!  Eventually the Geordies tired of trying to force a try over and settled for another Milky Bar Kid penalty.

Tigers 7^th and final try came after a lovely weighted chip from Syston’s Matt Cornwell, fresh from his spell in Mogliano, set up a Falcons line out 5 metres out.  The Geordie line out misfired all game, less so after the introduction of kiwi first team hooker Mike Mayhew but he suffered just the same this time as Tigers poached the line out.  Relentless drives resulted in Fraser Balmain being awarded a try.  Surely a good repost to the club that didn’t think him good enough at 18.

Ironically Falcons hooker George McGuigan was to profit from an over thrown lineout as he got a consolation try right at the death.  A good run from Falcon’s England group prospect Zack Kilbridge was snuffed out by a strong Matt Cornwell cover tackle, however Jimmy Stevens couldn’t find his man and the ball dropped into McGuigan’s thankful hands. 

Impressive performances:

Alex Lewington: strong carries made the difference early doors must be in line for a Premiership start soon.

 Fraser Balmain & Kieran Brookes: solid all day in the set piece and a real nuisance in the breakdown.  Responded well to a poor return last week and Balmian took his try well.

Needs to improve:

Dan Bowden: Needs to cut out the silly miss passes and focus on getting the ball through the hands.  If Allen went down today I’d rather have Matt Cornwell play 12 at Wembley.  Looked much more effective when he was more direct and using the short passes.

Man of the Match:

Has to go to Michael Noone, fantastic try to start the night off and was a real terrier the whole night.  Hopefully will sign on full time and could start pushing Waldrom and Crane for starts if this performance was anything to go by.