­Saturday, April 21

Tribute Cornwall and Devon League

Bude 45

Withycombe 27

THREE tries in the final 20 minutes helped Bude overcome an almighty scare from Withycombe in their penultimate home game of the season.

Bude found themselves 10-0 down inside the opening quarter of the game despite dominating possession but then scored three tries before half-time as first Ed Hilliam-Cooke smashed his way through his marker to score before great work down the blindside from Joe Wilson and Olly Denford ended with the latter touching down in the corner.

The final play of the half saw number eight Joe Wilson score as a series of scrums ended with Wilson having the simple task of placing the ball down after another pushover.

Withycombe capitalised on a mix-up in the home defence after a kick to reduce the deficit to two, but before the hour scrum-half Olly Mounce took the ball off the back of a driving maul to dart his way over from close-range.

A penalty ensured that Withycombe stayed within touching distance at 24-20 before Bude soared in the final stages.

First a great team try involving?Denford, Angus Hodges, Tremaine Fry and Rory Hodges, ended with the latter placing a superb offload into the hands of Hilliam-Cooke to run in under the posts.

With ten minutes to go a quick break upfield eventually ended with Denford taking a pop pass from prop Jason?Bolt to score before player/coach Angus Hodges rounded off the scoring when he dummy-passed to Rory Mead but ran through the gap to score.

Hodges was delighted with his side’s performance ahead of the big clash with promotion-chasing Saltash on Saturday.

He said: “We’ve probably put in our best three performances of the season in the last three weeks so we’ll go into the game confident.

“Saturday’s game was a really good mid-table clash with both teams playing well. However I always felt we had the edge in terms of we created our tries and there wasn’t a time in the game where we didn’t think we were going to win.

“There’s been a bit of a dispute between the clubs as to when this weekend’s game should be played so the boys will be riled up.

“We only have two games left so everyone is going to be up for it and making sure we put in another good performance.

“We’re always confident of our chances at home and when we played them down there we were always in the game so I’m excited to see what we can do.”

Bude —

Denford, Wright, A?Hodges, Hilliam-Cooke, Horwell, Watton, Mounce; Bolt, Cook, Allin, Williams, Kingdon, F Fry, T Fry, Wilson

Replacements: Black, Mead, R Hodges

Tries: Hilliam-Cooke 2, Denford 2, Wilson, Mounce, A Hodges

Convs: Denford 5

Pens: N/A