Cornish Pirates v Waterloo 03/12/06 match preview

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Cornish Pirates v Waterloo
Sunday December 3rd 2006 - Kick Off 2 pm

IT is said a week in sport can be a long time. However, these past seven days must have felt like an eternity for the Cornish Pirates as they stewed over last weekend's disappointing defeat at Otley.

Having travelled to Yorkshire top of the tree in National League One, the Pirates headed home nursing a third defeat of the season, plus the realisation that they had slipped to fourth spot.

On Sunday, the Pirates have the chance to not only rectify in some ways their 23-19 defeat at Cross Green last Saturday, but also get their campaign firmly back on track against a Waterloo side, who themselves were responsible for inflicting the first of those three league setbacks on the Cornish club back in early September.

Pirates coach Jim McKay has all season proclaimed there would be a "no-excuse mentality" from his troops this season and yesterday, true to his word, the Australian was again re-iterating the message.

"There are no excuses from us over last weekend, the best side won on the day," he said. "We basically have to face the facts and admit that we underperformed. In no way did we perform anywhere near the standards we have set ourselves.

"In this league, which is very competitive, if you don't compete to a certain level, you're going to come unstuck. That's what happened to us last week and now we have to aim to get back playing to the required standard."

He added: "I know you can't always play to 100 per cent, but it's when you drop down those few percentages, that's when you start having problems. If you're not having a great game, but still operate at about 85-90 per cent, then in most cases you'll probably pull through. It's when you're at 60 or 65 per cent, that's when things start to go wrong.

Coach Jim McKay

"Like I said, we have a no excuse mentality within the squad and it's up to us to put the things we did wrong last week, right this week."

With Rhodri McAtee away on Sevens duty with Wales in Dubai, plus the club imposing a week-long suspension on Tim Cowley following his red card at Otley, changes are afoot in the home camp for Sunday's clash.

As yet McKay has not finalised his 22 for this weekend's clash, that will be decided following today's final training session.

On the plus side, however, Canadian forward Stan McKeen returns to the squad having missed the Otley and London Welsh games having been on international duty against both Wales and Italy .

McKeen's return to action will certainly add more firepower in the Pirates pack, although whether he regains his starting slot is up for debate, particularly as replacement Chris Cracknell has impressed in his absence, scoring three tries in two games.

As for the game itself, the Pirates - who are still undefeated on home soil this season - know Waterloo will be no pushovers, despite their precarious position at the foot of the table.

McKay added: "We've already lost one battle of Waterloo , we don't want to lose a second. Sunday's game will be tough and it will be up to the boys to go out there and turn in a performance, especially after last week."

Waterloo head to the Westcountry for a second successive week having lost 40-7 at Plymouth Albion a week ago.

Pirates (from):
A Winnan, J Hylton, J Moore, D Bell, S Winn, D Roke, H Barratt, L Vinnicombe, A Di Bernardo, G Cattle, A Paver, G Anderson, D Seal, S Heard, V Ma'asi, N Makin, D Dawidiuk, J Beardshaw, H Senekal, J Inglis, C Cracknell, S McKeen , S Betty, I Motusaga, A Nicholls, M Evans.


Adryan Winnan	Jonny Hylton	James Moore	Duncan Bell	Steve Winn

Duncan Roke	Henry Barratt	Lewis Vinnicombe	Alberto Di Bernardo	Gavin Cattle (Captain)

Alan Paver	Grant Anderson	Dan Seal	Sam Heard	Viliami Ma’asi