BARBOS LOSE TO CHARLOTTE IN HEARTBREAKING FINAL
The men in Green & White fell to Charlotte 35-24 in a heartbreaker that will be remembered for years to come. Both teams duked it out on a hot Sunday afternoon in Atlanta, but Charlotte was the better team on the day. Former Barbarian Jeremy “Missile” Misailegalu was the man of the match for Charlotte after an eye opening performance filled with spectacular plays throughout the 80 minutes. Your Denver Barbarians fought until the last minute, but just weren’t able to get things clicking in attack. The Barbos left points on the board, and threw two intercept tries (by the hands of Missile) that stunted each comeback effort. After playing tenacious defense throughout the match, 14 points went out the door in seconds. The rest was history.
Charlotte opened up the scoring with a penalty kick to go up 3-0. The Barbos then struck back in the 8th minute through a multi-phased attack ending with Noah Pflaum darting across the pitch to put away Malik Bryant in the corner. Conversion sailed wide, 5-3 Barbos. Charlotte then sent the restart kick deep catching Denver off guard. Charlotte bundled the ball into touch and the Barbos immediately had their backs to their own try line. A couple phases later, the first intercept try ensued. Kicker Blake Jackson slotted the kick. Charlotte led 10-5.
The next 20 minutes were sprinkled with unforced errors (by both teams) and opportunities came and went. Denver finally pushed over a try after Mike Lawrensen picked from the base of the ruck and dove over the chalk. Liam Wynne slotted the conversion, 12-10 Barbos. Both team spent the next 5 minutes underfunding their ruck support and the defenses continued to make turnovers at the breakdown. At the 36 minute mark, the Barbo back line went to sleep and the 2nd intercept try ensued (again). Although they continued to fight until the end, the Barbos would not regain the lead.
Halftime score: 17-12 Charlotte
In the 45th minute, Captain Steve Karas appeared to charge down a kick resulting in a try, but the official went back and called him offsides. Charlotte came back a minute later and scored a converted try, 24-12 Charlotte.
At 55 minutes, Liam Wynne broke the line, committed the fullback, and put away Luka Pavlakis. Pavlakis played a fantastic match for the Barbarians, slotting into fullback and covering a range of high ball exit kicks by Charlotte. Wynne converted the try and the Barbos clawed back to a 19-24 deficit.
Mental errors by the men in Green & White began to stack up. Charlotte slotted another penalty to push the lead to 27-19 and the following restart went straight out. The Barbos got pinged again for shoving off the ball, and Blake Jackson made them pay with another 3 points. 30-19 Charlotte.
Charlotte would go onto win 35-24.
Thank you to all of the BarboFam for supporting this club in their efforts this season. I can attest that this group of players is more motivated than ever to get back to the final and hoist the hardware next year.
More to news to follow about the Denver Barbos 2022 Summer 7’s season.
As always, Bleed Green.