Latest Sport News:JAX SPORTS NEWS: Jacksonville Axemen win national rugby championship

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By BRIAN LOWE
American Rugby News

The American National Rugby League has crowned a new champion.

The Jacksonville Axemen have won it all by downing the New Haven Warriors 34-14 in the 2010 Grand Final Saturday in Philadelphia.

It is the Axemen’s first national title and they had to come from behind to win it.

Trailing 14-10 at halftime, a golden third quarter turned out to be the difference as Jacksonville’s playmaker Brent Shorten scored a hat-trick of tries in that 20 minute period to turn the game on its head.

“We said at halftime if we can control the ball and don’t give them a sniff we’re going to win this thing and I think it’s a credit to our fitness and the heat in Jacksonville that really got us over the line at the end, it was a great effort from the guys,” Shorten told ARN.

The Axemen five-eighth was named MVP for his all around performance, but he was well supported by the likes of Luke Gray, Adrian Grayson, Matt Clark and Matt Thornton, who all turned in massive games.

New Haven scored first in the 10th minute when skipper Siose Muliumu finished off a raid down the flank that came against the run of play. Jacksonville had been working in the Warriors’ end of the field, but a couple of dropped balls and a lapse in concentration saw New Haven mount a counter attack that resulted in the try.

Roy Leoni’s conversion made it 6-0 and that’s how the first quarter ended. Warriors pivot Damien O’Malveney increased the margin to 10-0 with a try early in the second quarter that resulted from sustained New Haven pressure.

With New Haven looking comfortable, Jacksonville finally got on the board in the 28th minute when fullback Kenny Britt found himself on the end of a series of passes that sent him into the try zone and with Shorten’s extras the scoreline closed to 10-6.

However, New Haven, which dominated the majority of play in the first half, stretched the lead to 14-6 in the 31st minute when Muliumu scored his second try in the corner, again following some excellent lead up work by center Derrick Roma and Blair Wards, who constantly crashed it up gaining valuable meters every time.

Then just on halftime, Jacksonville center Zach Matta edged his team closer with a try out wide that was the culmination of a midfield break by Grayson, set up by a nifty chip ahead by Shorten.

The third quarter was the turning point. It was the Brent Shorten show. The man from Helensburg, near Sydney, scored 18 unanswered points on his own to give Jacksonville what turned out to be an unassailable 28-14 lead going into the final quarter.

“It was a game of two halves,” said New Haven’s Siose Muliumu. “We played the first half well and in the second half we fell asleep and the Axemen capitalized on our lackluster efforts. We finished strong in the fourth quarter, but it wasn’t good enough, they were too far ahead to catch up.”

The final 20 minutes went back and forth and the Warriors had several scoring opportunities only to squander possession when they looked to be on their way to the try zone.

Fittingly perhaps, it was Jacksonville co-founder and coach Darryl ‘Spinner’ Howland who put the final nail in the Warriors’ coffin when he scored the final try of the game in the 78th minute. And for good measure, he then converted his own try to close out the scoring.

“We knew they were going to be as tough as nails for 20 minutes and then the next 20 we’d sort of match them up. We knew our fitness would get us over,” Howland told ARN. “It’s unbelievable.”

The crowd of 1300 that showed up at AA Garthwaite Stadium in Conshohocken was treated to a spectacle that was very much worthy of a Grand Final.

“Certainly, it was successful in a number of ways,” said AMNRL president David Niu. “We were successful on the field - it was good football. Successful off the field - great crowd, great corporate event and it was exciting for everybody.”

And so the 13th year of the AMNRL has come to a close with the Jacksonville Axemen being crowned 2010 national champions.

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