Cullompton 32 Bridgwater 3

BRIDGWATER and Albion Head Coach Kevin Innalls expressed his frustration at his side’s decision making, following a 32-3 defeat at the hands of Cullompton.

Albion had only a Stu Heal penalty to show for their afternoon exploits, and Innalls and assistant coach Simon Martin, couldn’t hide their disappointment. Innalls said: “It was a difficult afternoon with our guys making some crazy decisions," whilst Simon Martin described the side’s performance as: “Not quite there and complacent.”

The home side dominated play all afternoon with Bridgwater never looking settled.

Scoring opportunities were regularly spurned as careless handling and poor decision making took their toll on the visiting side.

Cullompton opened the scoring in the third minute with a penalty kick by Ross Toms; however when the opportunity was presented two minutes later to Bridgwater, Stu Heal put the ball wide of the posts.

The visitors repeated this miss just minutes later, before Toms then increased the home sides lead by again bisecting the posts after another penalty.

The home side looked the stronger side and their determination was rewarded after 23 minutes when outside centre, Adam Pearce went over the line for the first try of the afternoon.

Toms converted making the score 13-0.

After another successful home penalty, Bridgwater Centre Joel Clark received a yellow card for a spurious offside decision after a kick forward by Heal.

Despite being a man down, Bridgwater had their only try scoring opportunity disallowed by the referee as he adjudged it held-up; players and supporters at that end of the ground disagreed.

Bridgwater managed to get on the board with Heal kicking an easy penalty three minutes before the end of the half. This allowed the referee just enough time to sin-bin the Cullompton Centre, Toms for offside at a ruck, before blowing for half-time.

The second half saw many more Bridgwater handling errors and a further Yellow Card for Nick Spellissy. Cullompton's Pearce scored from the resultant penalty leaving the score at 19-3, before another Pearce penalty a few minutes later moved Cullompton further ahead.

15 minutes into the second half, Bridgwater's Nick Francis received a suspected neck injury which caused a 10 minute delay in proceedings.

Requiring Paramedic attention, the referee decided to relocate the match to the adjacent (albeit slightly smaller) pitch whilst an ambulance was called.

From the scrum restart in the new location, Cullompton put the ball out wide and Toms ran it in for Cullompton's second try. Brooks again converted.

The final score of the afternoon came again from Cullompton slotted another penalty over the posts making the finishing total 32-3.

The Bridgwater side must now turn their attention to next week's match when they face new league leaders Cleve at home.

Cleve are the only side to have won all three matches so far this season so it should make for an interesting game.

Scorers: Cullompton: Tries: Pearce, Toms Conversions: Toms (2) Penalties: Toms (4), Pearce (2) Bridgwater & Albion: Penalty: Heal Bridgwater's starting XV: James Bryant, Matt Hastie, Lovejoy Chatawama, Ali Blundell, Rob Thompson, Taylor Buller, Nick Spellissy, Dan Kemmish, Roger Drabble, Stu Heal, Joel Clark, Matt House, Garryn Basson, Arg Saliarelis, Nick Francis.

Replacements (all used): Matt Northey, George Sluman & James Brakes Referee: Kalvin Withers (Berkshire Society) ## BRIDGWATER and Albion III went down 31-0 to Burnham.