Cornwall and Devon Bideford 7 Tavistock 11 TAVISTOCK secured a valuable away victory at Bideford on Saturday despite fielding a much changed line-up due to illness and injury. The first half saw Tavistock exerting all the pressure and they were only denied by some determined defence. The forwards won the majority of possession enabling the Tavistock backs to ask questions out wide. In the centre Mark Ninnis, making his fist appearance of the season, and Mike Lyddon were direct in their approach but found no gaps to exploit. The forwards similarly were unable to find a way through despite the back row of Paul Williams, Tom Dawe and Paul Greenhill, who had an outstanding match, combining well and constantly putting pressure on the gain line. The only score of the first half came from a Josh Sutton penalty goal when Bideford were penalised for offside. The second half was a more even affair in terms of territory and with pressure being put on the Tavistock defence some superb cover and tackling was required form the Tavistock back three of Neal, Hudson and Bridgewater. Tavistock eventually forced a five metre scrum and this provided the platform for scrum half and captain Lee Greatrex to score a try in the left corner. The try was not converted and Tavistock had an eight point lead going into the last quarter of the game. Bideford then came back at Tavistock and scored a try under the posts via full back Ben Parry. The conversion by Michael Dunne reduced the Tavistock lead to one point. As Tavistock pressed for a score to settle the game they lost influential prop Steve Rush to the sin bin and were forced to see out the remaining minutes with only fourteen players. From the Tavistock pressure Bideford conceded a penalty near half way. Josh Sutton?s goal kick rebounded off the cross bar and in an attempt to secure the ball Bideford were again penalised ten metres out. Sutton this time slotted the penalty to secure a thoroughly deserved victory. The next league game is the West Devon derby match at Okehampton on Saturday January 22, kick off 2:30pm.
