Crows beat Cops

Jungle Crows 17 Kolkata Police 14
11 August 2007

Sunny finds light at end of tunnel

Late try to flanker-cum-center sends Jungle Crows to Centenary Cup semi

Untimely handling errors near the Kolkata Police try line had cost flanker/center Sunny Singh a pair of tries earlier in the match; his final sojourn with the ball inside the opponent’s twenty-two meters, however, in the game’s dying minutes, resulted in the try that handed Jungle Crows a hard-earned 17-14 victory. The win advances the Crows to a Centenary Cup semifinal to be played September 25 against the winner of Calcutta Cricket & Football Club/Young Rugby Club, at the CCFC grounds.

Down four points and awarded a penalty inside the Police twenty-two meters, the Crows kicked to touch five meters out from the opposition’s try line. A forward drive from the resulting lineout advanced two meters but was brought down by the Police defense. Prop forward Christophe Plais then made a go at the line himself and was held up. Plais deftly offloaded to a Crows teammate and the ball was spun out to the backs, where it ended up in the hands of Singh. Singh—who started the game at flanker and moved to the midfield when fly half Sanjay Patra came off for reserve forward Manas Jhana—made sure of this one, surging to the try line and rolling in with a defender upon him. The subsequent conversion by inside center Sailen Tudu put the Crows up three points and capped the day’s scoring. Tudu was successful in all three of his placekicking attempts and accounted for 12 of the Crows’ 17 points (1 try; 2 conversions; 1 penalty).

Said team manager Paul Walsh, “I had the feeling toward the end of the match that at any moment we were going to score. I thought, ‘at some point we’re just going to do it [cross the try line].’”

The Jungle Crows had had scoring opportunities earlier in the game. A bounty of handling errors halted some excellent attacking phases, including some obvious try opportunities for Singh and his teammates.

Strong defensive showings from both teams made the game a battle for field position in the first half. Effective kicking from the Police fly half put the Crows under pressure and led to first half’s only points, a converted try for the Police forward pack.

In the second half, the Jungle Crows’ attack found significant space to run in the wide portions of the field. Jungle Crows U19 player Pintu Das made significant contributions as a second half replacement in the wing position. Forwards running off fly half captain Sanjay Patra in the center of the field drew the defense, and Patra did a fine job of moving the ball to the backline. Outside center Nanda Gopal, visiting the Crows from Chennai, created openings for fullback Prosun “Tuna” Kumar Sao and his fellow outside backs to run through. At this point, the Jungle Crows attack began to show life. Dropped balls, however, influenced by pressure from the Police defense, denied the team what might have been a shining performance.

Yet after a Sailen Tudu penalty narrowed the score 7-3, Gopal put Tudu away in the most spectacular action of the day. Operating on a large blind side from a ruck forty meters from goal, Gopal took a long pass as first receiver and executed a clean draw-and-pass to the fleet Tudu. Tudu sprinted twenty meters untouched, then cut inside of two chasing defenders before winning a race to the try zone.

Kolkata Police responded through their kicking game. A chip kick from halfway bounced between more than a few Crow and Police hands and feet before ending up in the arms of a Police player for a try and a dramatic 14-10 margin, before Singh’s move took the lead away for the final time.

Jungle Crows:
1 Arijit Sarker 2 Ajay Kumar Singh 3 Christophe Plais 4 Nitish Kumar Singh 5 Md Sharib 6 Thoudam Gunadunda 7 Sunny Singh 8 Surrendra Jhana 9 Brian Wolf 10 Sanjay Patra 11 Sanjay Das 12 Sailen Tudu 13 Nanda Gopal 14 Rohsin Xaxa 15 Prosun Kumar Sao 16 Md Akhtar 17 Soubik Biswas 18 Nanda Majhi 19 Arran Manton 20 Pintu Das 21 Debasis Mondal 22 Manas Jhana

Calcutta Cup Semi Final CCFC 20 – Crows 14
 

July '07: Saturday 28 July: Bugger we could and should have won this one - the semi final of the Calcutta Cup. We had lots of possession and the boys played very well. Some serious experience amongst CCFC did for us in the end and they were just a bit better organised and able to implement their game plan.  Our planned higher tempo game never really got going as CCFC employed every tactic to slow us down.  Although we never lost touch with CCFC as the game progressed we could never quite finish.  Next time!!

Crows 23 - Army 3
 

Saturday 21 July: The Crows ground this one out a bit but at the end of the day it is the result that matters. A couple of enforced personel changes saw Brian (our US expat player and coach) play scrum half in place of injured Sanjay P. Brian had a solid game and kept the team moving forward well and even managed to introduce a couple of innovative penalty moves near the line. Sanjay D our diminutive winger (and Future Hope's carpenter) scored a couple of nice tries in the corners. Surrendra also scored a couple with some very direct running from No.8 – this really is his speciality.

Future Hope 10 – Crows 9


Saturday 14 July: Both teams were tense and nervous and the game very much reflected this. And it all came down to the last second…with the bell ringing the Crows were awarded a penalty in front of the posts. Tudu stepped up and slotted it through…this was surely an historic win for the Crows! But for the first time in our experience of Kolkata rugby the ref decided he would add on some injury time. Time for Future Hope to kick-off…a Jungle Crow to knock on and another Crow to play the ball…penalty Future Hope. The rest as they say is history…defeat from the jaws of victory!

A keenly fought game saw an unfortunate yellow card to Tuna in the second half for a high tackle. We also got marched on several times for some silly indiscipline. In a controversial incident the Future Hope try was clearly knocked on and their conversion it was later confirmed by the referee did not go through the posts, though the touch judges raised their flags. When the luck is not with you it is not with you.

But the Crows took heart from this match which saw us once again making progress against Kolkata's top team. Go the Crows!!

Crows 59 - Sergeants Institute 3


Saturday 30 June: Good win for the Crows and the team stepping up their game. Excellent performances from Guna, Tudu and Captain Sanjay. In the end to cheers of 'ALLEZZ' the crows had a record win snatched from them as the bell was rung by the Sergeants Manager five minutes early!

Calcutta Cup Starts
Crows 66 – YRC 0


Saturday 23 June:
The Calcutta Cup kicked of for the Jungle Crows this year with a fixture versus YRC. To be fair to YRC their team was much depleted after nearly all their players defected to the bright lights' of CCFC. The Crows put in a professional performance though with a clutch of tries from Surrendra, Zaffar and Tudu.

U19s at All-India Mumbai


17th June : 16 and 17 June was the first ever All-India Under 19 Rugby Sevens tournament. In advance Sanjay our Coach ran a two week preparatory camp in Kolkata. Having the boys brave very early mornings and heavy monsoon rains really helped the team bond together as a unit. We even had one session interrupted by a snake coming across the pitch!

Our travel to Mumbai was a bit of a trial as well. Although we had booked our train tickets well in advance they were not confirmed and on arrival at Howrah station we found we had no seats. Sleeping on the corridors next to the toilets was not really an option for 27 hours. Several phone calls later we managed to find tickets next day on Air Deccan – but that was the 2007 sponsorship blown!!

Saturday morning and all the teams were ready and warming up at the central Mumbai Bombay Gymkhana Club ground. A total of fifteen teams had turned out and the Jungle Crows had been ranked 12 th . We were drawn in what on paper seemed a tough group with Delhi Lions and Bangalore – both top senior teams.

First up and second game of the day Jungle Crows v Delhi Lions. Well we should have won, but nerves got the better of the boys. They were also a bit intimidated by Delhi's Fijian player – he was a damn sight bigger than our boys and made life difficult for us when he had procession and when covering our attacks. Five minutes each half also messed up our plans a bit…but a 0-0 draw was disappointing.

We only had an hour to wait for our next game and we were up against some more big lads from Bangalore. This time though the game plan clicked and we were able to move the ball freely and attack through gaps in the middle and out wide. Prakash on the wing ran in two good tries to make the final score 22-0. Great!!

The next day saw revised seedings and the Crows had jumped to 4 th and a quarter final against Orissa. Once again the plan worked and we were able to play a fast moving open game passing the ball and working to find gaps. Monu and Captain Tudu both got on the score sheet in a 19-0 victory.

So to the semi finals and at this point we regretted our failure to beat Delhi on day one and avoid top ranked team Armenians. We have played the Armenian boys plenty of times and as they played with the Jungle Crows for a couple of seasons we know them well. The Armenian boys are much bigger than their Indian opposite numbers and are always a challenge. The Crows started nervously again and a 20 point onslaught in the first half meant we could never get in the game properly. We did manage to hold them to a try a piece in the second half and run out 25-5 losers. Our only consolation was Tarak's try, the only one scored against the Armenians in the entire tournament…and by possibly the smallest player!

The Armenians went on to face Bombay Gymkhana in the final and were comfortable winners.

A great weekend for the Jungle Crows and we would now expect to be ranked 3 rd in India at Under 19 level having only lost one game as compared to two by the other semi finalist CCFC.

Odd Socks


May 2007 : For the last couple of seasons the Crows played with one blue sock and one green sock. This tradition dated back to the founding of the club when there was a competition as to which colour shirt the Crows should wear…Navy or Green. This was resolved by the winner of the first game – the greens. But to respect both teams every player turned out in one green and one blue sock.

This season we decided to acknowledge the services of one of our longest serving players by including him in the sock design. Christophe is French and so our sock designer got to work and came up with a blue, green and red banded combination for 2007. And very good they look to!!

‘Tour Aid’ tour to UK


April 2007 : In April the Jungle Crows development work was recognised by ‘Tour Aid' a UK charity working to give youngsters the chance to take rugby tours in the UK. Tour Aid asked Jungle Crows to put together an Under 14 team to represent India and take part in the ‘Nations Cup'. The Nations Cup will be played between ten teams from developing rugby countries in England during September.

The Crows have chosen to extend this opportunity to one of the schools we have worked with in Orissa in collaboration with the Tag Rugby Development Trust. The school is named the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS). The tour is intended to develop links beyond just rugby and also foster educational links, so working with one of our schools seemed appropriate.

KISS is a very special School as it is home to more than 3000 children all of whom come from the many Tribal Communities of Orissa. Tribal communities are some of the most disadvantaged in Indian society.

The KISS Jungle Crows will be hosted by Cams Hill School, partnered by London Irish Rugby Club and sponsored by UK law company Ashurst.

U19 Jungle Crows Step Up


Under 19 Success

Sunday 29 October '06: A full days rugby for the under 19 Monsoon Cup and boys from the Jungle Crows excelled! A total of two groups of five teams saw the Crows drawn against some tricky opposition including St. James School and Armenian College (who also run out for the Crows!). Crows also made up two Don Bosco Ashalayam teams, with Ashalayam A facing tough opposition in their group with Future Hope, La Martiniere and Orissa.

Both the Crows and Armenians won all three of their first round games to set up a great last round game against each other. In the end the power and strength of the Armenians meant they overcame the Jungle Crows 5-0. Ashalayam A also went into their last game undefeated and in a tough contest with Future Hope lost out by 12-0. So to the Semi-finals of the main cup and it was Jungle Crows v Future Hope and Ashalayam A v Armenian College....two cracking ties!

First up Ashalayam and in a dramatic encounter with Armenian College they lost out 12-10. For most of the second half Ashalayam were camped out in the Armenian half but were just unable to break through. With Crows first team players in each team the support was high decibel, if sometimes a bit confussed! In the second semi final the Jungle Crows ran out against Kolkata's top team, Future Hope. Half way through the first half Captain Sailen Tudu intercepted a Future Hope pass and ran 3/4 the length of the field to score 5-0. Amazingly the Crows were able to defend this lead for the rest of the game and though Future Hope came close, top defending by the Crows kept them out. The biggest upset of the day and the Crows were through to the final and another match up with the boys of Armenian College.

In the Plate final the Crows flag was kept flying right until the last game as Ashalayam B made it into the final versus La Martiniere. In a tense game the bigger La Mart's boys just won through but the smallest side in action had done the Crows and Ashalayam proud!

So to the main cup final. Sadly with the Kolkata light fading quickly play became increasingly difficult. But the Crows managed to go 7-0 up before the big and well organised Armenians fought back with two quick scores to make it 12-7. As darkness descended quickly time was called early and the Armenians went on to celebrate their victory. For the Crows though this was a great day and the results bode very well for the future; in the Monsoon Cup series Crows won the under 13s, got to the final of the under 16s and under 19s!

Calcutta Cup Semi Final


Future Hope 15 - Jungle Crows 0

Tuesday 5 Sept '06: This semi final clash between Future Hope and the Jungle Crows was considered by many as the game of this years tournament. Just 4 days before the final the Jungle Crows were the first team to seriously test Future Hope this season. 0-0 at half time the game was anybody's until Future Hope worked a beautiful try after 15 minutes in the second half and Scottish Under 19 International Graeme put them 5-0 up.

It could and would have been different had Future Hope's defence not been so well organised at the end of the first half and beginning of the second when the Crows enjoyed a great spell! A couple of fine back tries late in the game and Future Hope were through to the final 15-0. But perhaps one of the best Crows performances yet!

Kolkata's main season came to a dramatic end on 9 September ago with the final of the Calcutta Cup played between Future Hope and Kolkata Police. Future Hope stunned the Cops beating them 41-0 in a thrilling display of open running rugby!

Crows Win with Bengal


Tuesday 12 September '06: Jungle Crows were invited to join invitational teams Bengal Tigers and Bengal Rovers specially made up for the Police National Rugby Sevens held over two days in Kolkata. Jungle Crows coach Sanjay Patro was asked to coach the Tigers while fellow Development Officer and YRC Captain Mukhtar Alam coached the Rovers. Little did the Police realise that the Bengal Tigers, made up exclusively of Future Hope and Jungle Crows boys, would beat all in their way and take the trophy.

On the first day the Tigers were given a fright by home crowd favourites Kolkata Police, down 15-0 at half time. But the Tigers kept their cool (as you would expect from the most ferocious animal in the jungle) and seven minutes later it was 22-15 and the crowd had gone quiet.

So to the final and the Tigers took on tournament favourites Tamil Nadu State Police. Although the first half was close, ending 10-10 the second half saw the boys of Future Hope and Jungle Crows dazzle to win 34-10.

India's First Corporate Touch Rugby


Saturday 16 Sept '06: India's first ever Corporate Touch Rugby Tournament, title sponsored by BOC and organized by the Jungle Crows saw eight teams lining up for play. Played in the heart of Kolkata on the 100+ acre Maidan the event brought together a range of corporates and other organisations. The only tournament rules were that the teams had to have fun and no team was allowed to be made up entirely of regular rugby players. Each team that took part was allocated a coach from the 'Jungle Crows' and that coach worked with the team to get them up to speed for the event. Touch is a minimal contact version of rugby that is played for leisure all over the world, the rules are simple and every team that entered made great progress over the day. Teams included HSBC, Standard Chartered, Terra Indica, and Kolkata International School.

In the end it was the older and wiser heads that won the day. With Kolkata Environmental Improvement Project led by a stalwart touch player Jaap Buter winning the bowl, young guns from NGO Ashalayam the Plate and for the main trophy BOC took the honours ably led by Kiwi veteran rugby player Steve Watts.

The Corporate Touch event further reinforced ties between BOC and the Jungle Crows that first began some two years ago. In the week leading up to the tournament BOC also hosted a lunch for players from the Jungle Crows at their India HQ Oxygen House.