Saturday, September 8

Cornwall?and Devon?League

Bude 38

Topsham 19

BUDE kept up their 100% start with a six-try victory over newly-promoted Topsham at Bencoolen Meadow.

Angus Hodges’ men led 21-5 at the break thanks to three well-worked tries before adding the same number in the second 40.

The North Cornwall side took the lead on 12 minutes as loosehead-prop Jason Bolt crashed over after some good work in the forwards.

The second try on 21 minutes came after a brilliant break by inside-centre Charlie Watton. He then offloaded to Joe Wilson who then passed to prop Matt Williams, who in turn popped the ball to debutant outside-centre Kieran Sharp ten metres from the line.

Sharp then stepped inside the defender before going over to score.

The third try was pretty similar to the first as slow ball in the forwards eventually led to Williams breaking through a couple of tackles to score from five metres out.

The remaining 13 minutes of the half were fairly quiet until the home side were caught defending too narrow one too many times. An overlap down the right-wing allowed Ollie Gribbon to accelerate away to the line from 15 metres.

Hodges told his players to focus on their defensive duties and it was from man-of-the match Finley Fry’s turnover on the Topsham 22 that they extended their lead further on 47 minutes.

The loose ball was picked up by lock Will Kingdon, who then fed Hodges. Hodges’ dummy passed to the right before sniping through the gap to score from ten metres out. New skipper Olly Denford ensured he kept up his perfect record of conversions for the day.

With 23 points to make up, Topsham knew they had to keep attacking and they reduced the arrears just before the hour.

Some poor tackling coupled with a couple of tidy offloads allowed the ball to eventually reach Gribbon once more and he made no mistake from a few metres out.

Bude’s forwards were dominant and they went further in front on 66 minutes when replacement Ed Aldridge went over after successive driving mauls.

Topsham kept fighting away and Gribbon grabbed his hat-trick with four minutes to go to raise hopes of picking up a losing bonus point if they could score another try.

However, it was Kingdon who grabbed the final score as a series of pick-and-gos ended with the second-row dotting down.

Unfortunately for Denford he couldn’t make it five conversions from six but Bude ensured that they’re sitting pretty in third ahead of next week’s tough looking trip to relegated Torquay Athletic.

Player/coach, Angus Hodges, admitted he was pleased but wants to see more over the coming weeks.

He said: “I was pretty happy with the score as they played some good rugby and I was pleased with how we adapted throughout the game. When we needed to slow it down we did it well.

“In their 22 we kept the ball well and scored pretty much every time we got there.

“However, we could have used our backs a bit sooner but as we had a bit of a mixed backline again, we didn’t want to put too much pressure on them. Over the coming weeks we want to prioritise that and not rely on our forwards so much.”

Bude —

Denford (captain), R Hodges, Sharp, Watton, Horwell, Yates, Mounce; Bolt, Mead, Williams, Kingdon, Troke, A Hodges, F Fry, Wilson

Replacements: Bromwich, Aldridge, Comber

Tries: Bolt, Sharp, Williams, A Hodges, Aldridge, Kingdon

Convs: Denford 4

Pens: N/A

Bude’s man-of-the-match: Finley Fry