Randalstown entertained Cooke 2nd XV at Sunday lunchtime at Neillsbrook, Randalstown in a friendly fixture.
Our photographer Bob Given was there to capture the action.
The first half was a predominantly a war of attrition, between two equally matched packs, fought between the ‘22s’, with the backs rarely seeing possession.
The deadlock was broken on 33 minutes, with an unconverted try by Randalstown’s Rachel Lawrence, following a forward drive.
Cooke responded on half time with an unconverted try by Hannah Kilgore in the corner, to leave the scores level at halftime 5-5.
The second half was barely 2 minutes old when Lawrence scored her 2nd try, after a quickly taken penalty 10 metres from the goal line.
In the first sweeping backs movement of the game Teah Maguire scored in the corner to equalize at 10-10.
The realization that Cooke could exploit space on the wings lead to a change in tactics. Gone was the war in the packs, the ball was moved wide at every opportunity.
Cooke scored a further 5 tries. Maguire quickly added her second, converted by Eimear McQuillan, then Hannah Welshman scored an unconverted try, before Maguire completed her hat trick. The conversion was added by McQuillan .
Katie Kerr added a try on 76 minutes, converted by McQuillan, and the scoring was rounded off, in the last move of the game by Welshman, this time the extras were added by Kilgore.
Cooke will be pleased, particularly by their 2nd half performance. Randalstown can take pride in standing toe to toe with Cooke for 50 minutes.
