South West One

Weston-super-Mare 34 Redingensians 30

WITH the final quarter beckoning, Weston were in complete control. They had scored four tries without reply, resulting in a deserved advantage of 22 points, but what happened next was almost unbelievable.

They had always been in the red regarding the penalty count, but this was increased dramatically as the visitors were allowed back into the match.

Yards of ground were lost as the Seasiders continually got on the wrong side of referee Dino Mattern and at the end, the word fingernails came into the vocabulary loud and clear.

But Weston had started well. After James Mackay and Spike Chandler had exchanged penalties, the hosts then produced a superb 90-metre try.

Daryl Sanft's break started the move which ended when Sean Bennett came away from a maul to hand the try to Kevin Hobbs.

Mackay converted and seven minutes later his clever fly-kick along the right touchline resulted in an attacking line-out from which Ashley Russell produced the goods for David Burge's try.

Mackay again converted for 17-6, Chandler having kicked his second penalty.

The visitors were soon in further trouble when Phil Trott and Warren Milne were yellow carded and Weston took full advantage with a pushover try by Ross Bennett.

Mackay's third conversion followed for an interval lead of 24-6.

The visitors came back briefly with Chandler's penalty, but Weston looked safe and sound when the under-used Paul Sprague went looking for work which he found when he touched down at the posts from his intelligent grubber kick.

By this time, Mackay had been singled out for punishment and sent to the bin for general team indiscretions and Sanft deputised with the conversion to take the score to 31-9, but thereafter Weston were in reverse.

Continually penalised, the hosts conceded tries to Jeremy Flynn and Rob Stapely, both converted by Chandler and in the 80th minute, referee Maddern lost patience and awarded Redingensians a penalty try as well as yellow carding Dan Fry.

Chandler's easy conversion brought the score to 31-30, but in the sixth minute of stoppage time the penalty count was reduced to 18-5 and Mackay maintained his 100 per cent record with his second such score.

Weston: C Crichton; K Middlemiss, D Sanft (M Armstrong 70), S Bennett (M Armstrong 32-45), P Sprague; J Mackay (sinbin 54), R Bennett; D Price, D Burge (capt), S Williams (J Gallagher 70), M Kempton, A Russell, E Smith, K Hobbs, D Fry (sinbin 80)

Match Photos