Cokethorpe School (Witney) completed a hat-trick of Oxfordshire Under 19 Rugby Cup wins with a nail-biting 8-7 victory over Henley College in the final at Henley RFC.

Their success was built on a superb defensive display as Henley dominated possession, but failed to translate territory into points.

With their pack well led by Rory Paxton, the Henley forwards took the game to Cokethorpe from the start.

But the holders defended their line with hit after hit, and although they gave away a series of penalties, Henley opted to run them for no reward instead of settling for the three-pointers.

Against the run of play, Cokethorpe opened the scoring when outside centre Alex Isidro’s thumping tackle on winger Oli Jones forced a turnover, and the ball was swept out to right wing Nick Baboolal, who beat his man on the outside to run in from 40 metres and touchdown.

Henry Purdy missed the conversion, and a penalty from 35 metres in front of the posts minutes later.

However, he was successful with a penalty from a similar position soon after to make it 8-0.

Henley had the chance to reduce the deficit before the interval when they were awarded a penalty after a fracas, but scrum half Lucas Lee’s effort was off target.

Cokethorpe, with skipper Julian Watkins and fellow back-row forwards George Lane and James Silver to the fore, continued to come under heavy pressure in the second half, and they finally cracked when fly half Rob Bryson put second row Jack Horwood in to score under the posts.

Lee’s conversion reduced the deficit to one point.

Henley kept surging forward and it took heroic defensive work from full back Ollie Parsons and Purdy, who ripped the ball out of Craig Austin and Sam Botting’s hands inches from the line to keep them at bay before Cokethorpe were able to celebrate at the final whistle.

  • Source: Ultimate Schools Rugby, MashSport