NOLA Gold lost 22-10 to Rugby ATL in a Major League Rugby Eastern Conference Match on Sunday, February 16 at the Shrine on Airline. The match was the CBSSN game of the week.
After two weeks, Rugby ATL is in second place in the Eastern Conference with a 2-0 record and 9 points, while NOLA Gold has a 1-1 record and is in fourth place with five points based on a better point differential over Rugby United New York and Old Glory DC. The first place Toronto Arrows also has 9 points, but has a better PR then Atlanta.
Both teams won their home openers with NOLA Gold defeating Old Glory DC and Rugby ATL winning against the Utah Warriors.
On Saturday, February 22 the Colorado Raptors host NOLA Gold at the team’s home opener at Infinity Park at Glendale. Sunday, Rugby ATL host Rugby United New York.
NOLA Gold vs Rugby ATL Match Recap
Discipline issues impacted the match in the third minute with Kevin O’Connor sent to the bin for a high tackle on Rugby ATL’s Kurt Coleman.
NOLA Gold started the scoring with a try by hooker Lindsey Stevens with Carl Meyer adding the extras for a 7-0 lead.
Rugby ATL’s attempted penalty goal by Kurt Coleman sailed wide right and resulted in a 22-meter drop. Atlanta cut the lead to 7-5 after a maul with Jeremy Misailegalu grounding. That’s how the first half ended with Atlanta using excellent line speed and defending well. Both teams had difficulty with their wide game with the ball slick from the rain earlier in the day.
Second Half
The second half began with some back and forth play, but a high tackle on Rugby ATL’s Ryan Nell had Tim Maupin sent to the bin instead of Kyle Baillie, who was the offender. Kurt Coleman slotted the penalty goal to take the lead and then added another to push the lead to 11-7.
The teams then traded kicks with Carl Meyer first for NOLA Gold and then Hurt Coleman again, 14-10. With the defenses so strong in the wet conditions, penalty goals were deemed the easier avenue to scoring.
Coleman would add another penalty goal before a turnover led to a try by Rory Van Vugt for a final of 22-10 to Rugby ATL.
Squads with Player Article Links & Match Preview
NOLA Gold: 1 Matt Harmon 2 Lindsey Stevens 3 Dino Waldren 4 Ignacio Dotti 5 Kyle Baillie (C) 6 Moni Tongauiha 7 Kevin O’Connor 8 Cam Dolan 9 Scott Gale 10 Robbie Coleman 11 Julian Dominguez Widmer 12 Con Foley (VC) 13 Ross Depperschmidt 14 Tim Maupin 15 Carl Meyer 16 Cam Falcon17 John Sullivan 18 Ben Tarr 19 Billy Stewart 20 Kane Thompson 21Malcolm May 22 Trace Bolstad 23 Shawn Riley
Rugby ATL: 1 Jamie Ferrante 2 Alex Maughan 3 Duane Aholelei 4 Johan Momsen 5 Stefan Willemse 6 Vili Helu7 Matt Heaton (CC) 8 Ross Deacon 9 Duncan Van Schalkwyk 10 Kurt Coleman 11 Harley Wheeler 12 Ryan Nell (CC) 13 Jeremy Misailegalu 14 Harley Davidson 15 Rory Van Vugt 16 Amro Gouda 17 Chance Wenglewski 18 Cronan Gleeson 19 Conor Keys 20 Maciu Koroi 21 Kurtis Werner 22 Martini Talapusi 23 Jason Damm
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