Ruthven: 'We can push on next year' (From Ledbury Reporter)

Ruthven: 'We can push on next year'

3:46pm Saturday 26th April 2008

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LEDBURY'S director of rugby Bruce Ruthven has praised his players' "determination and character" after they missed out on promotion on the last day of the season.

Ruthven's side suffered a nightmare close to the campaign, beaten by Old Coventrians 44-0 on Saturday.

In a cruel twist of fate, it was Coventrians who leapfrogged Ledbury to secure promotion.

But despite defeat, Ruthven said his squad can take a lot of heart from the season as a whole and is already looking to go one better next year.

Though he conceded there will be players leaving the club during the summer, Ruthven hopes to keep most of his first-team squad together to form the nucleus of a promotion winning outfit.

He identified a tricky festive period which saw Ledbury lose five on the bounce as one of the reasons for his side's tense conclusion to the campaign.

But praised his players' character for winning eight of their last nine matches.

Ruthven said: "Everybody is very disappointed with not getting promotion but realistically we were well beaten at Coventry. Gener-ally we have no complaints.

"We will now look towards next season. Players will go and we will strengthen during the summer.

"We have to be realistic, it's a learning curve.

"In hindsight over Christmas we lost four or five games which put our backs to the wall.

"But the lads fought hard and it was nice to put it down to the last game of the season.

"The determination was there, we're happy.

"The lads have shown determination and character during the run-in.

"The better team won on the day. People at the club said Old Coventrians played their best game of the season against us last Saturday.

"We knew they would be a tough team to play against. They play a different game to us.

"We play wide, while they play a very tight game. But these things happen.

"This season we have been building a squad. If we can keep the squad together during the next couple of seasons we will be looking towards promotion.

"It's been a good year for the club overall, our second team have just got promotion."

For a full match report of brave Ledbury's last-day heartache, turn to page 87

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