Canada 29 Chile 11

Canada scored a deserved 29-11 win over Chile at the Prince of Wales Country Club in Santiago and in the process qualified in first place in the Americas Zone for the 2003 World Cup.

Canada played an unsteady first-half at the Prince of Wales Country Club in front of 4,000 as Chile caused it some early problems, but Canada stuck to its game plan of getting the ball wide.  In the second-half after an 8-5 half-time score, it put together some constructive phases of polished rugby scoring two tries by its wingers Calgary's Sean Fauth and Victoria's Fred Asselin.  In the first half Canada's No.8 Ryan Banks, who won "Man of the Match" honours, and a silver platter, scored a blustering try.

"We stuck to our plan," said Canada's coach David Clark.  "And we achieved our goal of winning the tournament and gaining first place.  The quality of refereeing was exemplary today and that allowed us to play the game the way we wanted to."

After a long feeling-out period that saw both teams squander scoring chances, Victoria's Bob Ross put Canada ahead with a penalty from 25-metres at 23 minutes:  3-0.  Canada went farther ahead two minutes later when Rod Snow, then Winston Stanley and finally Fred Asselin put together a fine phase of play down the left touch-line.  When Asselin was stopped in a tackle, No.8 Ryan Banks was there to take the ball in from the 22-metere line in a powerful run that saw him score in the corner carrying two tackler over with him.  No conversion:  8-0.

Chile worked its way to near Canada's line where it won a line-out at 35 minutes.  From the line-out it attacked in numbers employing South America's favourite weapon, the rolling maul.  When Canada stopped the maul No.8 Cristian Manzur broke around the side and scored.  Onetto missed the conversion.  8-5 and Ross missed a penalty at 38 minutes to end the half.

Canada looked far more focused and crisper as the second-half began as it put together some fine runs with Banks and scrum-half Ed Fairhurst to the fore.  Ross hit for a penalty at 43 minutes to put Canada ahead 11-5 before Fauth scored a wonderfully engineered try.

Canada won a line-out and with the backs on the attack, centre Nik Witkowski chip-kicked the loveliest of weighted kicks toward the Chilean corner-flag.  Sean Fauth passed his opposite number, leapt in the air, secured the ball and touched down for his fifth try in a Canadian jersey.  No coversion:  16-5.

At 53-minutes, referee Scott Young sent lock Jamie Cudmore, in his first start for Canada, to the sin-bin for using the elbow in a tackle.  After Edmundo Olfos was stretchered off Onetto made good on the penalty:  16-8.

Jared Barker, who replaced Ross at 53 minutes, kicked his first penalty at 59-minutes to widen the margin to 19-8 but Onetto hit one of his own at 66 minutes to make it 19-11.  A try by Fred Asselin, however broke Chilean resolve.  Ron Johnstone won a line-out, the ball went out to Barker who passed directly to Witkowski and this time the nifty play maker, tore though a gap and made ground.  He eventually passed to Asselin going at top speed to score under the posts.  Barker converted:  26-11.  Barker hit another penalty at 76 minutes as the clock wore down.  Final 29-11.

"They put a lot of store in their scrum and it fought manfully but in the end, when we got the ball wide, we scored two cracking tries," said Clark.

"We had to work hard for all our points today," said Canada's captain Al Charron.  "We put in a much better effort today than last week, and though we made mistakes our intensity and focus was there.  It is great to achieve our goal of first place."

"Its been long summer, but it has been fun," said vice-captain Winston Stanley.  "It was a close first-half, but we stuck to it and got the job done."

Whichever team wins next week, that team will win second-place and the loser and the USA will be tied on points and the winner will be determined by the margin ofpoints scored for and against in their respective matches.

"We must go to Uruguay and win next weekend," said a sad Alfonso Escobar the Chilean captain after the match.  "Canada played a very strong game today.  We made a lot of mistakes.  We were very nervous going into the game and we did poorly in the line-out.  We weren't focused enough and Canada took their opportunities well.  We will work hard this week and we'll strive for second-place in Montevideo."

The teams:

Canada:  1 Rod Snow, 2 Mark Lawson, 3 Kevin Wirachowski, 4 Jamie Cudmore, 5 Ron Johnstone, 6 Alan Charron (c), 7 Adam Van Staveren, 8 Ryan Banks, 9 Ed Fairhurst, 10 Bobby Ross, 11 Fred Asselin, 12 John Cannon, 13 Nik Witkowski, 14 Sean Fauth, 15 Winston Stanley
Reserves:  Jared Barker
Unused:  Leif Carlson, Marco Di Girolomo, Josh Jackson, Chad Plater, Kevin Tkachuk, Colin Yukes

Attendance:  4000
Referee:  Young s.

Points Scorers:

Canada
Tries:  Asselin F. 1, Fauth S. 1, Banks R. 1
Conv:  Barker J. 1
Pen K.:  Ross R.P. 2, Barker J. 2

Chile
Tries:  Cristian Manzur 1
Pen K.:  Cristian Onetto 2