Serious injury to Sam Russell casts a shadow over result

Feb 1 2012 by Our Correspondent, Birkenhead News

CALDY suffered their heaviest defeat for some time when they were well beaten away at Loughborough last weekend with the game being overshadowed by a serious injury suffered by centre Sam Russell.

He sustained a fracture to a bone in his neck and is presently in Leicester Hospital awaiting details of his future treatment and everyone at Caldy wishes him all the best and a full recovery.

Russell joined Caldy at Christmas and has become a vital and valued squad member and everyone at Caldy looks forward to seeing him back as soon as possible.

Loughborough are a fantastic side who fully deserve to be at the top of the league.

Their pace and power is second to none in this league and on Saturday their finishing ability was the undoubtedly the major difference between the two sides.

Caldy were first on the scoreboard after Andrew Soutar kicked a penalty in the 13th minute of the game but it was not long before Craig Holland hit back for Loughborough after he found space out wide on the left wing.

Loughborough followed that up with a second try through Ollie Robinson.

Both tries were converted by Hall to leave the scores 14-3.

After 29 minutes of the game, Russell suffered his serious injury following a good drive down the field as the game was delayed for some 15 minutes whilst the medical experts looked after him and the ambulance arrived.

Straight from the restart a powerful run from Adam Aigbokhae saw him break two tackles and power over the line from long range.

Soutar kicked the conversion.

It looked like Caldy would go it at the interval only four points down but on the stroke of half-time wing Callum Wilson had an easy run in to score in the corner and leave Caldy 21-10 behind at the change-around.

The second-half could not have started any worse as Edmund Rolston raced over following a Caldy handling error and Loughborough made the most of numerous Caldy miscues, as they scored three further converted tries.

Peter Doolan scored a well deserved first try for Caldy following an excellent driving maul, to reduce the deficit, but Loughborough were not finished as they finished the game off with two tries through Weir and Wilson in the last 10 minutes