Campbell College, Belfast entertained Ballymena Academy at Fox’s Field on Saturday morning in a schools friendly. 

Despite an early flourish from Ballymena, the home side enjoyed the better of the opening quarter as they rushed to a 15 – 0 lead with the strong breeze at their backs. 

Jack Bonnar knocked over an early penalty to be quickly followed by an unconverted try from Tom Robinson who barged over from a lineout miscue.

Some good tactical kicking from the home side kept Ballymena pinned in the bottom right corner of Fox’s field and a bit of quick thinking from scrum half Arthur Johnston saw him scamper over following a maul from an attacking line out. Bonner added the extras to push the score out to 15. 

Despite the one sided scoreline there wasn’t much between the teams and Ballymena finally got some reward for their efforts after working the ball up-field for Conor Louw to crash over and Ross McKay to covert taking the score to 15 – 7 at the break. 

A James Wright charge down led to Ballymena’s second try on resumption and with McKay converting to add to a second half penalty the visitors led by 2 points with the score at 15 – 17. 

In a ding dong second half the home side edged back in front thanks to a Zac Soloman  uncovered try before Josh Drain hit the line for a score converted by McKay. McKay added his second penalty, with ten minutes remaining, to extend the visitors lead to 20 – 27 and as the clock ticked down towards full time it looked as though that would be enough. 

However Campbell made one last effort and after a period of pressure on the Ballymena line Danny Williamson dove over out wide.

Bonner landed the extras, despite some close scrutiny from the Ballymena chasers and the game ended as a 27 all draw. 

Huge Gallery Below