CAS Rugby Merit List
Green and Gold Rugby thought it fitting to acknowledge some special players—and a special team for their efforts in adversity.
CAS team of the year
We did not choose a CAS rep side which typically squeezes good players into a team whatever their position—they weren’t playing anybody.
The selections were based solely on how the players played for their schools in the 2015 CAS competition and paid no regard to performances in trials or rep games, nor to how they played last year.
No regard was paid either to how many players were chosen from any school. The Champions, Knox, got fewer selections than we thought they would, but three or four others just missed out by one vote.
This argued that Knox not only had good players, but also that the sum of their efforts was greater than that of their parts. One could not give a team a higher compliment than that.
In most cases the players were chosen in the positions they played regularly for their schools, but since the school scrum laws are benign, forwards moved positions all the time and we decided not to be too stringent.
We took a similar licence in our midfield selections
Thanks to fellow selectors “sidelineview”, “Snort”, “Rugby Addict”, “rod skellet”, “oldandslow”, “Tahmen” and “Pilfer”for their input.
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CAS 1st XV
1. Tim Anstey (Barker)
2. Anthony Nguyen (Trinity)
3. Tom Hill (Cranbrook)*
4. Liam Rasch (Trinity)
5. Lachlan Swinton (Knox)*
6. Simon Pursell (Barker)
7. Harry Chapman (c) (Knox)
8. Harry McLennan (Trinity)
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9. Matthew Hayes (Aloys)
10. Bruce Thompson (Barker)
11. David Stenning (Knox)
12. Sam Lawson (Aloys)
13. Joe Williams (Knox)
14. Alex Diamond (Aloys)
15. Ryan Longville (Trinity)
* Also chosen last year.
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Player of the year
Lachlan Swinton (Knox)
There were many fights by the selectors in cyberspace but Lachlan Swinton was the universal selection for the second row.
The best player in the best team. Swinton epitomised everything that was Knox Grammar Rugby in 2015.
Hard, skilled, uncompromising and dominant. These attributes describe Swinton to a T and he can be proud of his season. The first man picked in the CAS 1sts, he went on to play NSW 2nds and eventually won selection in the Australian Barbarian squad, the only CAS player to do so.
As a key member of the Knox forward pack, he ensured clean first phase possession, was a brick wall in defence, and could carry the ball and offload with confidence.
He is a credit to his school, his coaches, his family, and to the game we all love. Congratulations.
Most valuable player
Alex Diamond (Aloys)
We were looking for a player whose value to his team, was greater than the value of any other CAS player to their team. As part of that we thought of what impact his absence would have on his team’s performance (compared to the absences of other candidates from their teams).
As the winger for St Aloysius, Alex Diamond played a pivotal role in his team’s success by using his size and athleticism to impact games.
Highlights included scoring 22 out of 27 points in Round 1 against Waverley featuring a hat trick of tries, and his standout performance against Barker with ten line breaks!
With an average of over a try game, Diamond is a deserved winner of the Most Valuable Player award.
Rising star award
We should keep an eye on Knox flyhalf Tom Woodcock, a Year 10 lad who steered the dominant team around park with the maturity of an older player.
Most improved team
This was the team that improved the most over the course of the ten rounds of competition.
Cranbrook
“The Brook” must be ruing what might have been. Their lads had good cattle on paper but too many of them were missing in the first half of the season and they had five straight losses.
In the return matches they had three wins on the trot and were shaping up to be the spoilers. The coaching staff had swapped some backs and with the forwards providing quality possession they got the desired results.
The hurdle of beating the first and second placed teams in their final two matches was just beyond reach, but to get within ten points of Knox was a commendable effort.
The players and coaching staff can be commended on turning their season around and playing each game in the spirit that would make Reverend Plume proud.
Try of the year
A 90-metre effort scored by Waverley v Barker – Round 8 at Queens Park.
Waverely fullback, Tyzac Jordan, fielded a kick on the burst ten metres inside the field of play and sliced through the Barker defence on a jinking 50-metre run.
After he chip-kicked over the fullback’s head Dion Narayan raced through to regather, and with the cover defence on him popped a ball up for Ben O’Sullivan to run onto.
As O’Sullivan was going to ground in a tackle, he slipped the ball back inside to Narayan, who sprinted 15 metres to score.
Game of the year
Knox 21 – Aloys 20 – Round 4
The valiant Aloys team can consider themselves unlucky not to post a win in this thriller at College Oval.
They scored three tries to two but Knox kicked three penalty goals during the match which made the difference.
The most amazing score in the match was in the second half when winger Alex Diamond charged down a Knox clearing kick and recovered it like a magician with sleight-of-hand, to score.
Late in the game Knox got to a lead of 21-15. In the dying moments Jack Mazaraki scored for Aloys, and the crowd was hushed because a successful conversion would win the game for them—but the conversion sailed to the left of the posts.
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