Video: 19-year-old Alfie Barbeary scores Wasps hat-trick his first Premiership start
There were tries galore across the five Wednesday night Gallagher Premiership games, 36 in total at Sandy Park, the Ricoh, the AJ Bell, The Rec and The Stoop. However, one player's scoring potency caught the eye more than most - the second-half hat-trick delivered by Alfie Barbeary for Wasps.
The 19-year-old hot prospect had a short debut off the Premiership bench last month in the win over Worcester, but that was nothing compared to what the hooker delivered when chosen to start versus Leicester at blindside, flexibility reminiscent of the double jobbing Ashley Johnson used to do at the club.
Making 69 metres off 15 carries, the youngster struck for a 16-minute second-half hat-trick, touching down on 45, 51 and 61 minutes while also providing the assist for another of Wasps' eight tries in their 54-7 destruction of a sorry Leicester.
Barbeary was selected ahead of in-form England prospect Jack Willis at flanker and his man-of-the-match pace and skill effort will surely register on the radar of Eddie Jones, who has been keeping tabs on the recent re-emergence of Willis.
The BT Sport footage of Barbeary's hat-trick was exiting. He took a Dan Robson pass before dummying and crossing for his first. Next, he demonstrated his power from close range after Leicester splintered a lineout drive, and he rounded it off with a show of athleticism to run in the third.
It left Lee Blackett swooning about the England age-grade captain. “Alfie had a mixture in the first half but he had an outstanding second half," said the Wasps boss. “As an out and out rugby player, he’s pretty good.
"He’s a big project. He’s nowhere near the finished article. He’s got to keep working hard. He’s a talent, there’s no doubt about that, but there are plenty of areas of his game he needs to keep working on. Hopefully, we’ll see him reach his potential.
“We’re trying to manage him by picking him in the back row. He’s a young kid and someone of his age it takes time to come through in the front row positions. We wanted to take the set-piece away from him, but we will keep working on the hooker side of his game. We just wanted to get him out there.”
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Ford completely took the energy out the game for us, waving his hands telling people to calm down. Just for us to die off and lose the momentum.
Bringing him on all the time to ‘close out’ games is condescending to Smith. Get Ford out and let Marcus Smith & Fin Smith run the show. The future is them so give them the keys and let them get on with it.
Go to commentsTaking Marcus Smith off was a big puzzle and probably cost England the game. However, Abs created more opportunities and scored some tries but left a lot out there through sloppy execution, not playing to the ref and no enforcement of English off-side play. The fact the game was close all through made it worth watching but it was a frustrating pectacle. English succeeded in slowing the game down and were in the refs ear which Gardner allowed. I think Ireland or France will punish the sloppy execution more than England so still much for ABs to work on.
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