One of the Navy representatives in the ASRU team, LS Chris Bohan, looks to weave his way through the US Combined Services defence during their match at Victoria Barracks in Sydney. Photo by Bill Cunneen.

The Australian Services Rugby Union (ASRU) team bounced back from its recent defeats with a strong victory against the might of the USA when it defeated the US Combined Services team 29-25 at Victoria Barracks in Sydney.

ASRU coach LCDR Mike Hogan said it had been a hard day at the office for the Aussies, with lots of hustle and bustle from the US team.

"In the end our guys gathered their patience, worked the ball and came out with a hard win in the end," he said.

The first half of the game was a poor performance by the ASRU team, with unforced errors tarnishing the Aussie efforts.

"From an ASRU point of view, the team didn't play well at all - there were uncharacteristic errors being made and we never got into the flow of the game we wanted to play."

A few team changes made the second half a better one for ASRU, who started to play with a little more purpose.

"It still didn't go according to plan - they kept at us all the time, like a dog on a bone, and they made it very difficult for us."

A number of penalties were given away in the second half by the Australian side, with the US team taking advantage of errors.

"You have to remember that the US is one of the top 16 rugby union sides in the world - they regularly make the world cup finals.

"These guys are looking to emulate that and I believe it's just been made a recognised sport in the US military, so they should get a little more support now."

US coach MAJ Clayton Gardner said theirs was a fairly young team and most of them were touring outside the USA for the first time.

"We played quite well in the first half - we knew if we didn't come out right at them we'd be in deep trouble.

"The second half, we started to tire about halfway and our fitness really killed us in the last 10 minutes."

Gutsy win for RAN By WO Ron Giveen RAN Rugby Union (RANRU) put on a game for the US Combined Services rugby team on June 27 at Randwick Army Barracks. This was the first hit-out for the USCS on their Australian tour, with the side short of a few people as they were crash-posted to places such as Afghanistan. RANRU coaches JC Campbell and Dixi Lee had a quick opportunity to meet and greet their players, while USCS was training the house down. When run-on occurred, USCS was in full swing and led 14-0 after just five minutes, which says a lot for having a warm-up. The skill level and size of USCS initially surprised a lot of our players, however RANRU overcame and took it to them, running out winners 22-14. Chris Bohan, Jason Cook, Rod Taylor and Brad Simmons had stand-out games for RANRU. This team consisted of Navy players from Sydney and the Nowra Area, five current ASRU players on tour, two soldiers from the Royal Australian Engineers at Moorebank and two Defence civilians. The full team was: Andrew Bailey, Sean Learoyd, Rod Taylor, Shaun Deigan, Julius Tadulala, Joe Restifo, Nathan Busch, Matt Lane, Jason Cook, Ollie Pollities, Chris Bohan Brad Simmons, Ben Meerman, Stephen Olson, Andrew Thorpe, Adam Allcroft, Andrew Elget and John East. There were two additional players who had recently arrived at FIMA/Sydney from Cerberus. Ian Sutton and Rod Brennan did a fabulous job organising the event and provided logistical support. Mark Crocker has come a long way as a referee and had a good game, while Carl Oberg and Rod Brennan ran the line.