Report and Pictures by Roger Pike
Lydney 35 Newton Abbot 5
Mills at the double for Severnsiders
A minutes silence preceded the game for John ‘ Copper’ Morris who sadly passed away at 82, he was one of the towns greatest and longest serving players with over for 450 games for Lydney and numerous representative honours. He was a sports master at Lydney Grammar School and then Whitecross nurturing many of Lydney’s future players, a talented sportsman who also played cricket for Lydney and a true giant of the town.
Although at the basement of the table the visitors from Newton Abbot gave it a real go at Regentsholme and the Severnsiders needed to dig deep in a match played in proper rugby conditions of wind and driving rain. Lydney’s promotion push is really back on track with a fourth consecutive win but it was not as easy as the score line suggests and the match was still tight at half time, only in the second half the Severnsiders finally got to grip with conditions and managed out a convincing win.
The Severnsiders started the brighter and dominated the opening encounters with the hosts unable to get out of their own half. After just 6 minutes back rower John Barker drove down centre field to set up a ruck which was spun out to centre Joe McClean who broke through the away sides defence, brought down close to the line he off loaded to the speedy winger Conal Mills who scored out wide for 5 – 0. Newton Abbot really gave it a go and the game remained even for the next 10 minutes with the away side unable to break a strong Lydney defence. A good Severnsiders attack by prop Costner Lane was halted by an infringement at the ruck and Tony Wicks knocked over the penalty to move the Severnsiders further ahead at 8 – 0. Newton Abbot even though at the wrong end of the table showed excellent spirt and pounded the Lydney line for a long period close to half time, they looked sure to score but a crunching tackle from Riley Scriven saw the ball dislodged and Lydney escaped to end the half at just 8 – 0 ahead.
With the away side still very much in the game Lydney started the second half strongly looking to put the game out of site and dominated from the restart, with the forwards regathering the ball from loose play the ball was spun out wide and winger Conal Mills grabbed his second try out wide for 13 – 0. The away side continued their tactic of playing forward drives in the very wet conditions and were finally rewarded when Ryan Partridge was driven over to get the away side back in the game at 13 – 5. The Severnsiders raised their game and started playing to the conditions, a big drive from John Barker was quickly moved to the backs and Joe McClean broke through the visitors defence to score close in, Tony Wicks knocked over an easy conversion to put the hosts out of sight at 20 – 5. Lydney proved dangerous every time they spun the ball, with centre Joe McClean causing the hosts all sorts of problems with his powerful runs and also making some massive hits in the tackle was very good all afternoon. Lydney had the luxury to empty the bench with the impressive Phil Cowburn entering in the centre and the speedy Mike Cross on the wing only strengthened a very strong home side. With the pack now dominating the set piece a penalty would be forthcoming from most scrums, the forwards kept the ball and from some strong drives saw a ball moved to back rower Jack Knox who found a great line to score unopposed to extend the lead to 20 – 5. The Severnsiders pack were now rampant creating havoc with the Newton forwards and driving at every occasion, on one good drive by Kurt Brown, centre Phil Cowburn appeared and broke straight through the ruck on half way only to be tackled deep into the 22 where he gave the perfect offload to scrum half Alex Peel to score. With the injured Wicks off Olle Locke knocked over the conversion to end the game 32 – 5 and the full 5 points for the Severnsiders.
Head Coach Lee Fortey commented ‘delighted given the conditions this was a good but workmanlike performance, we still have plenty of improvement to address. The main positive is we are winning when not playing our best rugby but that’s four on the spin and we are bang in the promotion hunt. To be fair they turned up and gave it a real go, their league position does not reflect their standard of play, we had to dig deep on occasions but managed the game out well, a bit more patience would have seen us score much sooner and have the game out of sight. We will need the selected 15 to be on their top game next week as will be very tough away at North Petherton who are strong at home but we now have a good balance of youth and experience so fear nobody ‘.
