Saturday, April 13

Tribute Cornwall and Devon League

Bude 29

BUDE ended an excellent season with a workmanlike victory over Tavistock at Bencoolen Meadow.

The game was all but over at half-time thanks to four tries before a fifth followed soon after. However, Bude’s ill-discipline again reared its ugly head as they received three yellow cards in less than 20 minutes which inevitably led to a consolation try by Ethan Lamerton.

Bude made four changes from the side that suffered just their fourth defeat of the season at South Molton.

Player/coach Angus Hodges was missing after being sent-off in North Devon while Matt Williams, Luke Dunkin, Kieran Sharp and Rory Hodges were back in place of Rory Mead, Angus Hodges, Ryan Butler and Jack Horwell.

Tavvy had their RNEC Cup final against Tamar Saracens at Devonport on Wednesday night and if they had their eyes on it, it showed as Bude took the lead inside four minutes.

After keeping the ball in the forwards, Williams ran a hard line and broke through a couple of tackles to score from ten metres. Skipper Olly Denford slotted the extras for a 7-0 advantage.

Bude doubled their lead on th quarter-hour mark with a well-worked team try.

Tavistock cleared their lines with a kick which was caught by right-winger Rory Hodges. Hodges ran down the touchline before passing to hooker Jason Bolt, who did likewise to Denford, who eventually played in Sharp to runaway to score under the posts from 20 metres.

Bude grabbed a third try on 22 minutes. After a driving maul was illegally stopped, the Cornishmen again chose a lineout and another driving maul proved too hot to handle with Bolt dotting the ball down for the try.

The mid-table Moorlanders were given a lifeline on 27 minutes as lock Joel Troke was shown a yellow-card for a high tackle.

However, they failed to make the most of that and conceded for a fourth time shortly before the break.

A Bude scrum to the left-hand side of the pitch on the 22 was dominant once more, and they played the ball down the blindside for replacement winger Callum Bettington to beat his opposite number and get to the line. The conversion was missed.

Bude had lost just once at home all season and grabbed their fifth try two minutes into the second-half through Hodges’ brilliant solo effort.

A Tavistock 22-metre dropout didn’t go very far and was caught by the winger on the ten-metre line, ten metres in from the touchline. He ran forward, weaved past two players before beating another pair for pace and just managed to get to the line despite an opponent being on his back.

Despite being 29-0 ahead, Bude then lost their way. On the hour, replacement Chris Allin didn’t retreat 10 metres from an offside, and as it was a repeated offence, was sin-binned.

Four minutes later scrum-half Olly Mounce suffered the same fate. He thought the ball had come out of a Tavvy scrum and dived on it, however the referee said it hadn’t.

With 13 men, Bude had to defend well and they did for the most part, although Lamerton managed to grab the Devonians solitary try when he found a gap from five metres. Rob Pratt converted.

Bude gave away plenty of penalties and suffered their fourth yellow of the afternoon when Bettington was offside at a ruck in his own 22.

However, Bude kept the visitors tally to just seven points as they ended the season with 101 points after earning 21 wins, one draw and four defeats.

Player/coach Angus Hodges was delighted with his side’s willingness to compete on the final weekend.

He said: “To only let away seven points when we’ve got four yellows just shows the amount of heart and passion the boys put in.

“It was a pleasure to watch from the sidelines as they were putting themselves into everything just to make sure we got a big five-point win. Even though the performance throughout the 80 minutes wasn’t the best we’ve seen all year, it was still a nice way to finish.”

Hodges, who intends to carry on again next season, admits that he felt that a couple of things here and there could have seen them pip champions Penryn and Honiton to promotion.

He said: “We can only really hold our hands up. There were mistakes that we made that cost us in the race for promotion and if next year we want to look at it as a serious goal, we’re going to have to be clinical all season and make sure we have the depth in our squad.

“There’s a lot more to consider than just turning up on a Saturday and we need to make sure that we’re at it during the week and not take the foot off the pedal.

“It’s a difficult job to get promoted and we need the players and the club as a whole to buy into it, to do it.

“There’s a few areas where we’re still not consistent and we definitely have more to give. But it’d be exciting to hopefully carry on the momentum from this season into next year.”

Bude —

Denford (captain), R Hodges, Sharp, Watton, Green, Pharo, Mounce; Williams, Bolt, Jeffery, Troke, Kingdon, F Fry, T Fry, Dunkin

Replacements: Allin, Bettington, S Yates

Tries: Williams, Sharp, Bolt, Bettington, R Hodges

Convs: Denford 2

Pens: N/A

Bude’s man-of-the-match: Olly Denford