Saturday, September 29

Cornwall and Devon League

Hayle 14

Bude 63

ANGUS Hodges scored a hat-trick as Bude romped to a 63-14 victory at Hayle on Saturday.

The North Cornwall side were dominant throughout, scoring ten tries in all — five in each half.

Despite beating Lanner 17-0 at Bencoolen Meadow seven days earlier, there were three changes.

The half-backs were once again changed as the unavailable Jonny Wright and Charlie Watton were replaced by Olly Mounce and Steve Yates at scrum-half and fly-half respectively.

In the pack, Ed Aldridge made his first start for the club in place of the absent Luke Dunkin.

Hayle’s Memorial Park is a big, wide open pitch which allows for plenty of free-flowing rugby.

Hodges, who is also the player/coach, had said he wanted to see an improved performance and he led by example scoring the opening try inside five minutes.

After receiving the ball at inside-centre on the ten-metre line, he stepped inside fly-half Stuart Trathen before breaking a couple of tackles to score in the far left-hand corner.

Just minutes later it was 12-0 and it came thanks to some sterling work by left-winger Jack Horwell.

After receiving the ball he chipped it over the top. As he about to collect the ball to score he was illegally pushed over, meaning Bude were awarded a penalty try.

Hayle had lost their opening four games but were back in it when a lineout ten metres from the Bude line ended with winger Talan Daniels scoring in the corner. Trathen converted.

Bude continued to play well and extended their lead to eight points when skipper Olly Denford slotted over a 35-metre penalty.

The visitors’ third try was created by the brilliance of second-row Joel Troke.

He rampaged down the centre of the pitch but was finally tackled ten metres out.

The ball was spread out into the backs for Hodges who waited for the defence to drift across before sniping through a gap. Denford’s conversion hit the post.

With ten minutes of the half remaining, Bude continued to go for the jugular and it worked.

Hooker Jason Bolt dotted down following a driving maul before prop Matt Williams showed a great combination of skill and strength to spin out of the tackle and hand-off the full-back to score and give Bude a 32-7 lead at the interval.

Despite the half-time break, Bude continued from where they had left off in second 40, although they had to wait ten minutes for their next score.

Replacement flanker Freddie Saxton received the ball from Mounce before beating the full-back and running in from 40 metres. This time it was converted.

As the home side tired the scoreboard continued to tick along nicely.

Man-of-the-match Kieran Sharp dotted down next as a couple of dummy lines gave plenty of space for the outside-centre to run around the side of the defence and beat the tracking winger from 25 metres out.

With 20 minutes remaining Bude led 44-7 and it was now a case of how many they could score.

Winger Rory Hodges scored first as an overlap allowed him to cross in the right-hand corner before Denford added the ninth try when he crashed thorough the midfield.

Hodges grabbed his hat-trick with less than ten minutes to go as he picked the ball up at the base of the ruck, ran through a gap, chipped the ball around the full-back before collecting the ball to score. Denford converted to make it 63-7.

Damian Lynes did get the last word for Hayle but the damage was long done by then.

Hodges admitted that he couldn’t have asked for more.

He said:?“The performance is what?I was most worried about from the get go.

“The fact that most of our tries were scored through backs moves showed us that the performance was well-rounded throughout the whole squad. I couldn’t really be much happier and already excited for Saturday.”

While Hayle are winless, Honiton will arrive in North Cornwall with a perfect four wins from four with a points difference of plus 232.

However Hodges is confident they can cause an upset.

He said: “They were alright last season but it’s going to be an interesting game considering the results they’ve had so far but we’ve got of players back from injury. If we play anything like we did on Saturday coupled with the fact that we’ve got players back means we should be able to put in a good performance.

“We’re at home and with the crowd behind us that should put us in good stead.”

Bude —

Denford (captain), R Hodges, Sharp, A?Hodges, Horwell, S Yates, Mounce; Allin, Bolt, Williams, Kingdon, Troke, F Fry, T Fry, Aldridge

Replacements: Saxton, A Yates, Sobey

Tries:?A?Hodges 3, penalty try, Bolt, Williams, Saxton, Sharp, R Hodges, Denford

Convs: Denford 4

Pens: Denford

Bude’s man-of-the-match:?Kieran Sharp