ORFC gain first victory against Dalziel

Orkney RFC put their opening league defeat behind them as they got their campaign off and running with a hard-fought 29-3 win against Motherwell-based, Dalziel in their first BT National League Division 3 home fixture.

With a decent crowd roaring the home side on, on a cold Saturday afternoon, Orkney got off to an explosive start after three minutes. Denis Hayes did fantastically well to offload the ball to hooker, Scott Rendall who outstripped the Dalziel defence and put the ball down for a try, James Linklater made no mistake with the conversion, making it 7-0. However, just minutes later, Dalziel got their first points on the board with a well-taken penalty conversion to make it 7-3.

With fantastic scrummaging by the Orkney forwards, they were putting Dalziel under some heavy pressure, however they had to be alert at the other end as they were fortunate to emerge unscathed following some careless play inside their own 22 metre line. It wasn’t long before they were afforded a huge slice of luck when a Dalziel penalty smacked off the post and bounced back into play.

Just as it seemed the first half would end at 7-3, Orkney put themselves further ahead courtesy of a beautiful try scored by number 15, Phillip Ross. Captain, Alan Brown picked the ball up from a scrum and passed it to William Thomson who showed fantastic hands and awareness to quickly offload the ball to the lightning quick Ross who, leaving Dalziel’s backs trailing in his wake, touched down in the corner. With Linklater missing the conversion, the half-time score was 12-3.

Orkney started the second half in the same way as the first, with a try. Good, intelligent play left an easy try for the young, Kyle Robb to get his name on the scoresheet and with the conversion by Graham Poke missed, this left the score at 17-3.

Dalziel weren’t giving up however, and put Orkney under some intense pressure but the red and white’s stood resolutely, not giving the Central Belt side an inch of space. After a hard-fought second half, Orkney put the game to bed on sixty minutes with a William Thomson try, unfortunately, the conversion was missed.

Ten minutes later, Orkney got their fourth try of the game — securing a bonus point — and it was scintillating to watch. Linklater offloaded to the, already in full flow, Ross who’s pace took a number of Dalziel players out of the game. Just as it seemed he would be stopped in his tracks, he quickly offloaded the ball to the Hayes who sprinted clear to put the ball down at the goalposts. Thomson put the conversion between the posts to make it 29-3 to secure a well-deserved and hard-fought victory.