Saturday, April 6

Tribute South West One (West)

Cornish All Blacks 34

Thornbury 31

THE Cornish All Blacks remain right on the coattails of leaders Okehampton heading into the final weekend of the season after edging past a lively Thornbury outfit 34-31 at Polson Bridge.

Launceston started slowly and were fortunate not to go behind before they got into gear to lead 22-12 at half-time.

And although the Bristolians were arguably the better side in the second-half as well, the All Blacks did just enough to thwart a late fightback to set up a thrilling conclusion to the campaign, which sees the Cornishmen welcome in-form Lydney and Oke, who are three points clear, travel to Plymouth to take on fellow Devon side Devonport Services.

Even if Devonport win and Okehampton pick up two bonus points, then the title will be Okehampton’s as they have a much superior points difference and won both meetings between the two clubs this term.

Ryan Westren and Ian Goldsmith were able to pick from a fully-fit squad for the first time all year against Thornbury. Such was their choices, they had to omit the likes of Jordan Duke, Andy Knight and Shaun Crawford from the matchday 18.

From the 27-10 win at Keynsham, the coaches made three changes as Cornwall Under 20s trio Dan Goldsmith, Torin Clarke and Reuben Edwards were all recalled in place of Duke, Harry Lightfoot and Aiden Jacob with the latter two joining Chae Jenkins on the bench.

In front of an expectant crowd, the All Blacks were playing on home soil for the first time in five weeks and started slowly, finding themselves camped in their own half for the opening 15 minutes. However, they showed excellent concentration to defend and keep the games scoreless, even if the visitors did have a try disallowed for a forward pass within 90 seconds.

As all good sides do they grew into the game and took the lead on 17 minutes.

A penalty was kicked to the left-hand corner where a driving maul from ten metres was finished off by scrum-half Adam Collings.

The pattern of the game was pretty even but the All Blacks went 8-0 ahead through a Glenn Coles penalty just before the half-hour.

And on 33 minutes they led 15-0 without playing anywhere near their best. Great combination work between Marc Williams and Clarke saw them get to within a metre of the line. And when Collings’ pass was about to be finished off by Westren, a Thornbury player deliberately slapped the ball down, resulting in a penalty try.

The final ten minutes of the half, which included four extra minutes, was a thrilling contest as Thornbury fought back superbly.

First, scrum-half Harry Glew showed excellent strength and feet to break a tackle and dot down after some fine work down the wing, before the All Blacks responded shortly after through Clarke’s try from a five-metre scrum, which came about as a result of Reuben Edwards’ brilliant 40-metre run where he was adjudged by referee Paddy Dummett to have been held up.

However, with a few seconds left of the clock in the half, Launceston decided to kick the ball downfield instead of out of play and it cost them as full-back Alfie Richardson, who had saved a certain try by tackling Edwards shortly before, picked the ball up some 60 metres out before chipping the ball over the first line of defence, catching it cleanly and then sprinting away to score in the far corner. Jake Wood missed the kick but Thornbury were in with a shout.

That try clearly given the visitors confidence and they reduced the lead to five points soon after the restart as more great work down the Thornbury left saw inside-centre Wood link with his midfield partner Dan Hussey before Hussey drew full-back Tom Sandercock to pass to Wood to run in unopposed from 20 metres.

But Launceston’s scrum was proving too hot to handle and they extended their advantage once more on 53 minutes.

From a scrum close to the Thornbury line, Clarke lost control of the ball with his feet as they pushed them back, but Collings fed Westren who was never going to be stopped from a metre out.

The next stage of the game saw less try-scoring opportunities although the home side did pass up a golden chance when Martin Kneebone failed to supply Williams with a pass which would have surely seen him score.

At 27-17 the All Blacks had control but their lead was reduced to three points with ten minutes to go as scrum-half Glew grabbed his second after he was played in by the impressive Wood after they once more found it too easy to penetrate the home defence.

Westren was left breathing a huge sigh of relief with a few minutes to go when a stray pass — which if collected by Sam Poustie — would have seen the winger score and probably win them them the game, was dropped.

Any hopes of a shock away win were extinguished on 78 minutes as flanker Lloyd Duke ripped the ball off Glew on Thornbury’s own try line and dotted down. Coles kicked his second conversion from four.

The Thorns did grab the last word to secure a second bonus point when a driving maul from a lineout was five metres was finished off by hooker Sam Evans, but in the end it was the Cornishmen who had picked up five crucial points in their quest for a return to the Tribute South West Premier, and most importantly, guaranteed a promotion play-off on April 27 if Okehampton do the business at Devonport.

Skipper Lloyd Duke admitted their mid-table visitors provided quite a threat.

He said: “They’ve got one of the better backlines in the league. I think it’s no secret we, at times, can have defensive lapses and that was proved on Saturday. When a team can move the ball with ease, we need to learn to concentrate for longer periods of time.

“Arguably two lapses of concentration at the end of each half meant that instead of a 34-19 scoreline, it was 34-31. Their try just before half-time gave them a bit of belief but if we were 22-7 up like we should have been at half-time and then dominated the opening five minutes of the second-half, we should have put them to bed a lot easier.”

Although they did that in the end, they couldn’t have chosen much harder opposition for their final game of the season at home to Lydney on Saturday.

The Forest of Dean club were in a relegation battle for parts of the season but have moved up to seventh, meaning they’ll travel down from Gloucestershire in good spirits.

Duke said: “Lydney are going to come down here with a point to prove after we won there on the opening day of the season. But we have an awful lot to play for. If Lydney are up for the game more than we are then there would be something seriously wrong as we have a lot more to play for than they do.

“I think, also, in the back of a lot of the boys minds, we went to Lydney two seasons ago and essentially relegated us, so there’s a good incentive for us to put that right.”

With the All Blacks powerless to prevent Okehampton winning the league, Duke hopes his troops will ensure that if Oke do slip up, they are there to pounce.

He said: “Although Saturday is not like a normal game in what’s at stake, it is in the sense that we need to go out and win. But because of the result on Saturday I’m sure training tonight (Tuesday) will have an extra edge to it in regards to how close to it was and that we weren’t on the top of our game.

“We know the importance of the result this Saturday so that’s what’s driving us on this week.

“We know that Saturday wasn’t exactly how we wanted to play, but at the end of the day, five points was our objective and we managed to achieve that.”

Kick-off at Polson Bridge is at 3pm.

Cornish All Blacks —

Sandercock, Morton, Edwards, Westren, Kneebone, Coles, Collings; Bentham, Bulut, Thomas, Williams, Goldsmith, Clarke, L Duke (captain), Rowley

Replacements: Jenkins, Lightfoot, Jacob

Tries: Collings, penalty try, Clarke, Westren, L Duke

Convs: Coles 2

Pens: Coles

Cornish All Blacks’ man-of-the-match: Harry Lightfoot