UW Men in Italy
Apr 27
University of Wisconsin Rugby Club
Italian Tour
Matches:
Pavia March 29, 2010
Cremona March 31, 2010
Castlemaggori April 2, 2010
The long awaited tour began on the Saturday of spring break with the long ride in the yellow school bus to our Alitalia overnight flight from Chicago to Rome. We managed to get 2 weeks of training in at Brittingham Park as the snow melted early this year so we had been outside just had not played real rugby since early November.
We had a good side on the tour with lots of experienced seniors and many of our younger players that had contributed in our undefeated fall league season. We also picked up 4 players from UW Milwaukee to fill out the team. We had a total of 29 players including player coaches Nic Tyson and Paul Stroede. Bruce Hill and Phil Callen also made the trip giving us a traveling party of 32. We had one set of parents join us for the Monday match in Pavia.
After some delays in Rome, we were met in Milano by Joseph Walker our tour guide, and later at the hostel by our former exchange student and player, Fabio Raimondi. We had the boys take a run to the park that was packed on Sunday afternoon with locals enjoying the lovely sunny day. We moved our training session to a nearby parking lot and Bruce Hill proceeded to work out the jet lag and the stiff bodies to prep us for a match on Monday.
The usual 1st night of tour shenanigans provide ample cases for Kangaroo Court prosecutors, but everyone was on time for the walking tour of Milano on Monday morning. We took the walk to the subway, then the metro then the train to Pavia for the 1st match. Pavia is Fabio’s home town and local club and was the Middle Ages capital of Lombardy. Fabio was proud to show us the historical sites and the local university so we had more walking the afternoon before the match.
Kickoff was in the early evening so we had some sunlight initially but mostly played under the lights. They scored in the opening 5 minutes off a short line out with some extra forwards in the back line and a nice move to put a try in the right corner of the end zone, 5-0 Pavia. We put the ball in their end but missed a penalty kick. Several penalties against us for not releasing quickly enough in the rucks in the early going gave Pavia a line out in our end. They won the ruck in the middle of the field and then got quick ball back to the left and overloaded us for a try in the corner by the prop. The tough conversion kick was good giving them a 12-0 lead.
We responded and put the ball in their end and were awarded with a penalty kick that our #10 Corey Katzban made. Captain and second row Andrew Hanske took another kick off that gave us good attacking ball. Unfortunately, as fullback Ben Knight was making a nice line break, he also pulled the same hamstring that kept him out of the Notre Dame playoff game last fall. Ben still managed to kick the ball to the corner before he limped off the field. Ben Davis our hooker and flanker Alec Schlinder chased and blocked the clearance kick and #8 Quinten Reuter fell on the ball in the in goal for our 1st try of the match. Corey made a tough conversion kick bring us to 10-12, 13 minutes into the match.
Alec Schindler made another of his trademark hard tackles that left him a little woozy, so Zach Arostegui replaced him at #6. Some aggressive play by the forwards and good counter kicks from the backs kept the ball in their end resulting in a 35 meter Corey penalty kick to bring us ahead a point at 13-12. A scrum at mid field with some hard runs by the forwards took the ball to their 22. We were awarded a penalty kick from the side but missed. Pavia got the ball back down on our end with a few more penalty kicks to touch; then a penalty on the goal line and a quick tap ball to the wing allowed another score on our left side, putting Pavia back in front 17-13. After a nice long break from a wheeled set scrum by Fabio for Pavia, they kept the ball in our end for several minutes. Some strong defense on our line kept them out of the goal. A long clearance kick to their end gave us some play near their 22 and we were rewarded with a penalty call that Corey slotted bring us back within a point at the half; UW 16 - Pavia 17.
At the half, we were confident we could win if we could make some adjustments in the back line defense by communicating better when help was needed and continuing to take the ball up strong in the forwards. Only a few minutes into the 2nd half they threw in to a short line out just in our half of the field, they bobbled the ball and #7, Ryan Funderburk took the ball on a long run through their backline. Two of their players left their feet in the subsequent ruck and were penalized. Andrew Hanske took a quick tap through the mark and outran their wings and fullback for a 45 meter try under the posts. The conversion was good to give us back the lead at 23-17.
Pavia came right back with some good runs off the base of scrums and then followed with a driving maul to push the ball across the line, leaving us in front a point 23-22 as the conversion was no good. Pavia scored again in the same corner with another nice move off the back of a scrum out to the wing. Kick no good again put them up 4 points, 27-23.
We countered immediately with good line out ball near mid field and Garrett Donath who had moved from wing to fullback took the ball on a nice line, broke the line, kicked it ahead and recovered for a 50 meter try. The conversion under the posts was again good giving us a lead of 30-27. We misplayed a ball on our end that resulted in a scrum near our line. Their #8 went right with the wheel and had open field to the try line. Again they missed the kick and Pavia led by 32-30 at the 58 minute mark in the match.
We showed we had some gas left in the tank but taking the ball upfield with a series of at least 10 possessions through the rucks finally stopped by our knock forward. Our strategic subs of Guido and Tyson helped us keep the ball in their end. Corey then knocked over a 40 meter penalty kick from the middle giving us a 33-32 lead with just under 10 minutes to play. I knew we needed to score again to win. They already had 6 tries and if they could get enough ball would likely score another. We began to control the game down in their end and spent another 5 minutes with possession before pushing in the clinching try. Substitute scrum half Ryan Zigman touched down for the honors. Conversion by Corey was again good giving us a 2 score lead of 40-32 with about 5 minutes remaining.
We kept possession in their end for most of the remainder of the match and we had our first win on tour. It was a great game to play or watch and both teams played good open rugby.
Pavia hosted us next door to the pitch with the usual good Italian food and beverage. We had a nice sing up and were joined by Fabio’s parents and uncle (a former Italian international flanker). The boys stayed in the gym next to the pitch and everyone was fit and ready for the 9 AM training session on Tuesday morning.
The next match was Wednesday against Cremona, a town of 70,000 about an hour southeast of Milan in the Po Valley. This match and the Friday match were played on an undersized field in a beautiful setting next to the Po River in the small village of Casalemaggiore. The first was a Wednesday afternoon match and some of the local players were unable to leave work leaving the side we played inexperienced and not as competitive as the Pavia team.
We scored 8 tries and converted 6 in the 1st half and led 52-0 at the half. 9 tries and 3 conversions in the 2nd half gave us 51 more points. They scored 12 points bringing the final score to 103-12, not the kind of competitive match we wanted but better than being on the receiving end of a similar score as has happened before on overseas tours.
The Cremona team made up for their inexperience as players with their enthusiasm for hosting us. The arranged a reception for us in the ancient town hall with the mayor immediately after the match. The next day we were special guests at a private concert with the music director of the museum that contained the world’s most expensive Stradivarius. The boys then climbed to the top of the bell tower next to the cathedral and sang a Varsity from the Bell Tower that could be heard all over town.
Many of the same players were there for the match on Good Friday but they added quite a few better and more experienced players from the area, several of which were former or current Italian national team pool players. We threatened several times early in their end but were unable to score due to some missed passes to open men. We scored 1st 11 minutes into the match on a counter of a kick, a ruck we won at midfield that #8 Quinten Reuter took to the right and fed hooker Ben Davis who outran everyone 30 meters to the goal, 7-0 UW.
Casalemaggiore had a number of kickable penalties in our end in the 1st half that they either ran or kicked to touch rather than take the 3 points. They told me later they wanted to play open rugby than kick for points passing on 12-15 points in the 1st half and similar numbers in the 2nd Half. The score could have been considerably different as they were repelled time after time by our defense near our goal line. We scored just before half on a counter kick by fullback Garett Donath that took a fortunate bounce over their fullback and into Garret’s hands. He then made a nice move to beat the wing and take the ball in for the score. Halftime score was 14-0 UW. We talked at the half about reducing penalties, getting our scrums lower and playing in their half of the field with clearing kicks rather than running.
We had nice backline play on a lineout from midfield with wing Phil Winkler taking the pass from the fullback on cutting back to the inside. The resulting ruck finally got us a penalty call from the ref but we missed the penalty kick.
They were able to get the ball back in our end but we had a turnover ruck and got some nice movement through the hands of #7 Ryan Funderburk to Loosehead prop Adam Carlson to Center Tim Slater then back to fullback Garett Donath for a 70 meter try. 15 minutes into the 2nd Half and we led 21-0. WE had trouble scrummaging against this team all day but took one left as we were wheeled and the #8 Q was able to avoid several tacklers and touch down for our 4th try of the match and a 28-0 lead with 20 minutes to play.
Everyone had played at least one half of rugby on the tour so far and we managed to play everyone at some point in this final match in Casalemaggiore. They again spent a fair amount of time near our goal in this half but were unable to push anything across the line and refused to take their kicks for points. The score was not reflective of the competiveness of the match.
Matt Kuester who had come in as a replacement flanker took a ball that bounced out the side of one of their rucks that they thought was a dead ball the length of the field for our next score. Another successful conversion kick by Corey gave us a 35-0 lead. I am not sure how we scored the last try as my camera ran out of battery at the 38 minute mark of the 2nd Half but the final score was 40-0, UW. It was a good win for our 1st ever undefeated tour.
We had nice sunset of the verandah of the bar overlooking the river before we headed to Cremona. There we had the usual great Italian feed and later some singing in the square next to the cathedral in the center of town. The next day was free before the early Sunday flight home so 10 of the boys took the early train to Cinque Terre on the eastern coast for some beautiful hiking while the remainder took in historic sites, artwork or shopping in Milan.
We won’t be going to the nationals this spring but we our tour to Italy for spring break was memorable for everyone concerned. The boys raised funds on their own with raffles and some construction work-days. We were able to pay for our team polos and t-shirts and a team dinner with a matching donation from Don Becker (former player and coach) of $2,500.
Remember the date of May 1, 2010 as we are planning a reunion for the whole Madison rugby community including as many players as we can from former UW teams. Details to follow.
Thanks,
Skip Heffernan
Coach UW Rugby
