Crusaders Coach Griffiths Pleased To Have Week Off Before Scorpions Showdown

North Wales Crusaders coach Clive Griffiths is pleased that his side will have a weekend off before facing South Wales Scorpions at The Gnoll on Sunday 5th August (kick-off 3pm).

It’s the second big Welsh derby of the year and with the North Wales side taking the first honours back in March, he believes that having no match this weekend will help his side claim a double over their Welsh rivals, with the Scorpions having to travel to London Skolars this Sunday in a rearranged match.

“I am pleased that we have a weekend off,” Griffiths said. “We’ll have a full bill of health then for that. The only thing is will be my selection process. Danny Hulme will hopefully be fit by then after his ankle strain. Jamie Durbin too after his groin injury. Everybody will be hunting down a place for this game.

“I read that the Scorpions are going to use the next five games to build for next year. Well we’ve been doing that since we started – building for 2013 as this is our first year and we were going to try and test players.

“Against the Scorpions on August 5th, we will give a few players a game who’ve not had the chance recently. I’ve been rotating the team like that over the last few weeks.”

The Crusaders will be going into the game on a defeat, after losing 34-6 to Rochdale Hornets last Sunday and Griffiths knows that the loss was down to his side not taking their chances.

“It was one of those days. They played well and we didn’t where it mattered, it was a simple as that,” he said.

“We did do a lot of good defence but whenever we made a mistake, they were clinical. To be fair to them, they were refreshed after their break. For 15 minutes it was an arm-wrestle then one misread in defence and they were away.

“We had some chances but we bombed one or two of them. We could have been 12-10 up at one of those points and then it would have been a different complexion on the game.

“To be fair they took another chance just before half-time, that made it 16-6 and we knew we needed to get the first chance of the second half and we didn’t take it.

“But ’m not down about it as we created so many good chances. We’ve got the ability to turn over anybody and I mean that, we just need to take our chances. We’ll need to do that against the Scorpions at The Gnoll a week on Sunday to get the win.”

Tickets for South Wales Scorpions v North Wales Crusaders are now on sale at a special online price of £10 for adults, £6 for concessions and £2 for children aged 12-16. Entry is free to all aged 11 and under.

They can be bought by going to http://www.scorpionsrl.com/page.php?id=1991 or can also be bought in person at the Neath RFC No 13 club shop in Old Market Street in Neath.