Luxembourg hosted the British Army (Germany) in a match in ideal conditions at Walferdange on Saturday, but was unable to record their first victory although the score line was far closer than the previous three encounters.

Luxembourg actually opened the scoring with a penalty from Ciaran Keane, who had a solid match and showed continued improvement from his Age Grade representation, displaying courage that was not always matched by his teammates.

The British Army, although struggling sometimes at the scrum, where Luxembourg certainly did appear to have domination, ran hard at the opposition and it was clearly evident that the local boys were not used to this level of intensity and eventually the visitors scored two tries to lead at the break 12-3.

Luxembourg used the match as preparation for the upcoming European Nations Championship match in Ljubljana against Slovenia and made numerous substitutions at half time and immediately on the resumption BA(G) crossed for two quick tries and a comfortable 24-3 lead, but a wonderful kick chase by Tim Seite saw an intercept try and Luxembourg closed the gap to 24-10.

Although Luxembourg toiled manfully, they were not able to get any fluidity or flow into the attack and often one aggressive tackle from the visitors stopped any forward movement. BA(G) were much better at continuity and only some good scrambling defence, combined with some errors by the Army saved the score from increasing. Two more tries however were conceded before Yared Ketema scored a fine solo try in the corner for a final score of 34-15.

As an exercise for Luxembourg it was a good hit out and the positives were the scrum and some fine individual defence, but the areas requiring improvement were cruelly highlighted; notably continuity and support play, as well as decision making especially on attack. The defensive line was very slow going forward and lacked aggression, an area of concern for the national coaches but will be worked on in the coming weeks before the visit to Slovenia on 18 May.

Marty Davis is national technical director at the Luxembourg Rugby Federation. For more information, check its Facebook and Twitter feeds.