Jones proud of achievement this season

Leighton Jones says the players can be “proud” of their achievements this season after guiding the club to a top-half finish on their return to the Indigo Premiership.

After more than a decade outside the top-level of club rugby in Wales, Pooler have shown they deserve to be back among the best with a series of impressive performances and results across the season.

It looked like they would end their season on a high after Matthew Jarvis added the conversion to Dan Hill’s try, which cancelled out Jordon Liney’s opener, to give Pooler the lead.

Tom Ellis hit back for the hosts, which was converted by full-back Sam Earl-Jones, before Dylan Kelleher-Griffiths levelled the score with a try of his own.

Louis Williams edged RGC back ahead before Earl-Jones fired over a penalty on the stroke of half time.

Earl-Jones added the conversion to a Dan Owen try as RGC edged further ahead but Walker Price kept Pooler in the game with a well-worked try, which was converted by Jarvis.

Earl-Jones struck another penalty before a late rally from Pooler saw hooker Sam Scarfe touch down. Jarvis’ conversion reduced the deficit to just four points heading into the final minutes.

However, Earl-Jones had the final say on the game with a late score, which was converted by outside-half Dion Jones.

“I don’t think the scoreline reflected the game with the last try of the game,” explained head coach Jones.

“It was a tight game, both teams went out there and gave each other a bit of a battering.

“I think the boys were heavy legged. There were a lot of tired boys out there, it was a patched-up squad.

“It’s a difficult place to come but the boys did battle for 80 minutes.”

Despite the result, Jones is pleased with how the squad has performed this season and is confident the club can continue to progress going forward.

“We were newbies in the league,” he added.

“We’ve been written off by most teams and most fans so to come here and end up finishing sixth is a great achievement for the boys.

“Arguably, a couple of games we lost we could have won and finished a little bit higher but the boys can be massively proud of themselves and their families and supporters can be proud because we’ve come into this league and shown everyone that we do belong.

“The foundations are solid, they were put in a fair few years ago now and every year we’ve looked at ourselves and asked how can we get bigger and better.

“We keep doing that season by season and hopefully next year, in a different league, we’ll keep growing those foundations and get better and better.”