By David Sillifant

CORNISH All Blacks player/coach, Ryan Westren, admits that ‘we would probably take finishing one place above the relegation zone’ following nearly a quarter of the season gone.

The Polson-based club were relegated into National?League Three South after failing to win a game in National Two last season, and although initially the prospects for the season looked bleak after losing their first three matches, Jimmy Tucker’s side have responded by beating Salisbury and Bromsgrove at home in titanic tussles which were decided in the dying minutes.

Despite the two wins, they still currently sit second bottom after six matches played, although only one point seperates them in 13th and Lydney in ninth.

Before they beat Salisbury at the back end of September, it had been 35 league games without a win, and Westren couldn’t hide the importance of getting the monkey off their back.

He said: “Beating Salisbury was absolutely huge for us as a team and as a club as you could see by the scenes at the end of the game. Before then we quite simply weren’t used to winning as a team and as the games go on your confidence just gradually goes. Losing, like winning, is a habit so for us to break that meant everything and now we can look forward.

“In an ideal world we wouldn’t have wanted to face Camborne in our next fixture (a 50-11 loss) but we backed up the Salisbury game in our last home game against Bromsgrove with a victory although we made that a lot closer than it should have been.”

Four of their six games have already been played at home, and if Launceston are to survive, Westren admits that it is their form in front of their own fans which will either ensure a comfortable end to the season or a fight right down to the wire for survival.

He said: “It’s absolutely vital that we make Polson Bridge a fortress again. If we can win most of our home games and pick up the odd win here and there on the road along with some bonus points then we should be absolutely fine, but we have to go out there and do it which is obviously a lot easier said than done.”

While it’s going to be an interesting season once more as they look to stay up, Westren believes that if the squad perform to their potential then a mid-table finish is on the cards, especially with the significant drop in standard.

He added: While we’d obviously take finishing one place about the relegation zone right now there’s no reason why we can’t finish a fair bit higher. Although others may disagree with me, I think the standard is quite a bit lower and if we can keep gaining confidence by winning games then we shouldn’t have to much to worry about.”

Last weekend’s reserve date, gave the chance for some of the fringe first-team players to get a run-out for the second team at home to Taunton and allowed the coaching staff of Tucker, Westren and Brett Luxton to work on some things with the players.

Ryan said: “Last week we did something a bit different. On Tuesday at training we prepared like we would for a normal game on the Saturday but on Thursday we did a bit of a gym session sort of thing just to vary it up a bit. This week we’ll be back to normal preparing for our game at Newton Abbot.”

When asked what needs to be further improved, Westren admitted that they need to finish off the chances they’ve created.

He said: “We need to become a lot more ruthless. Obviously the lower standard means we’ve been able to create more opportunities but we haven’t been scoring the tries some of our play has deserved. Yes we want to play a nice brand of rugby but at the stage of our development it’s about winning and becoming safe.

To achieve that it’s about making sure our fundamentals are right such as making our tackles and making our set-piece strong.

Two of the star performers this term have been right at the heart of that according to Westren.

He said: “Jordan Duke has really come on this year, he’s now 22 and he seems to have grown into a man’s body so to speak and is making hits and tackles which he may not have done previously which has made a big difference for us while scrum-half Tom Sandercock has been really good for us. Yes he still has things which he needs to work on but he’s scored a couple of tries and has a real will to win which you can’t teach. As long as he keeps that and keeps improving we have a really good player on our hands.”

The Newton Abbot game is the third of their games with rivals from Devon and Cornwall.

The East Devon side are three points ahead of the All Blacks and Westren is expecting a tough game.

“As with a lot of these sides we haven’t played for them a number of years but they do have some players we’ve played against before so we know a bit about them. It will probably be a big old scrap and a lot of it comes down to who wants it the most but we’ll go there with confidence and try to bring something back with us.

“Unfortunately I am unlikely to be involved as I’ve had a small neck operation this week to clean up some old damage but I’m sure that we’ll go and give a good account of ourselves.”