North Tawton 12

Plympton/Victoria 35

NORTH Tawton were almost at full strength, captained by Kevin Avery and with club captain Neil Peters back from a short lay-off, and young prop Lloyd Marshall moving back to second row, releasing Adam Hooper to slot in at number 8.

In the first minutes they pressed into Plympton/Victoria's 22 and a good drive off the back of a maul by Hooper allowed Tawton's elusive fly-half Phil Wale to jink through the defence and score under the posts. The clock was only showing three minutes of play as Ross Lawrence slotted the conversion.

On eight minutes Plympton were close to the home side's line. From a set scrum, scrum-half Neil Wright broke off and scored their first try. This was converted by fly-half King.

An early push at a set scrum by Tawton's impressive pack was penalised close to their posts. The subsequent tapped penalty led to Plympton's Martin Brown driving through to score near the posts, converted again by King to take the score to 14-7 in their favour.

A scrum saw Tawton 's pack at their best with the front row of Phil Moses, Adrian Pierce and Danny Wonnacott taking a heel against the head. This was capitalised on by Tawton and a missed pass to Ross Lawrence on the left wing left him with a long. looping run outside the defending tacklers to score close to the corner. The distance defeated the attempted conversion.

Having made little telling headway at breaching the try-line Plympton's fly-half finally got into range to slot a drop goal. The half ended with them in the lead to 17 to 12.

In the second half a mistake on the 22 metre drop-out gave Tawton a scrum in a threatening position back on the 22. From this a break by Tawton's Hooper broke down. The home team were unable to put together the passes to score, and the moment passed.

Plympton were starting to gain some superiority and territorial advantage. Their pack was starting to show strength in set pieces and the Tawton back row of Hooper, Avery and Richard Letbridge responded with good disrupting runs. Frustration began to show, however, as Tawton gave away two penalties, converted by the boot of Plympton's King.

Halfway through the second half Tawton's hard-running centre Charlie Ewens was replaced by Simon Fear. A penalty kick at goal by Plympton fell short but the knock-on gave them a scrum on the five metre line. Further substitutions into the scrum brought on Neil Peters and Steve Hann, but this was insufficient to stop a scrambled and somewhat fortuitous try for Plympton's full back, Lee Ainsley. King again added the points.

Plympton kept up the pressure and were able to score a final, unconverted try by their captain Chris Hunt, assisted by Chris Isaac.

This week Taw Meadows sees a double-header with the women of Tavistock/North Tawton Combination taking on Bideford in a league game at 1.30pm followed by the traditional Easter meeting between North Tawton and Okehampton. All are welcome to what should be an excellent day's rugby down by the Taw.