Regional 1 Tribute South West

Weston-super-Mare 28 Launceston 26

Although by no means perfect Weston-Super-Mare’s display against Launceston was a marked improvement on the previous week’s disappointing 51-10 defeat away to league newcomers Chew Valley.

“It was a definite improvement but there is still plenty to work on. It was obviously a relief to get a win – that was what this game was about,” Weston-Super-Mare’s director of rugby George Sparks told the club’s website.

“We’ve had a tough week and we just had to go back to some core values – work rate, physicality – and that was what impressed me in this game because that has sadly been missing from our game too many times this season.

“That returned in this game – not for the full 80 minutes, we were still up and down in a few areas – so credit to the lads. Last week [at Chew Valley] there were a lot of questions quite rightly asked, and tough to answer, about what it meant to wear the Weston shirt.

“What we can ask for now from the boys is that to have this performance Launceston as a real standard. That is the level that we move forward from in a couple of weeks’ time when we travel to face Lydney.”

Weston made a promising start but were undone by a misplaced line out which the visitors took full advantage of to open the scoring. Their lead didn't last long as a trademark try by centre Cameron Maslen who cut a fine line from a pass by scrum half Dan Lomax allowed fly half James Mackay to put Weston in front.

An excellent fifty twenty-two from Lomax followed by a strong burst by captain Tom Sugg ended when a superb miss pass by Mackay put full back Chris Young over. Mackay again converting.

The visitors hit back with a try by the dangerous Daniel Pearce who added the extras to his score to reduce the deficit to two points but on the stroke of half-time number eight Ben Cox was on the end of a catch and drive by the much-improved Weston pack to make Mackay's conversion a comfortable one.

The second period began with Weston's fourth try which secured a bonus point when great work by man of the match prop Rich Ford and Cox led to Maslen once again finding an excellent line before a superb offload to fellow centre Huw Morgan who put Mackay away to the line. The fly half converting his most difficult kick of the afternoon.

Launceston didn't give up and were rewarded with a penalty try which resulted from a deliberate knock on by Young who found himself taking an enforced ten-minute break and then Pearce crossed once again before converting to make it a nail-biting finish, but the hosts prevailed.
Some great performances especially by Ford who not only worked hard all game but produced an excellent bone crunching tackle when Weston were under the cosh in the second period.

Cox and fellow back rowers Billy Kirk and Callum Kingscott along with prop Gary Carpenter who played the whole eighty minutes can be pleased with their performance as can Sugg and Ashley Russell who apart from the opening line out generally secured possession for the remainder of the match.