SOUTH WEST 1 WEST

BRIDGWATER & ALBION 27 CLEVE 32

AN ERROR-ridden fifteen-minute spell saw Bridgwater and Albion squander a 21-point lead at home to league leaders Cleve, as they went down 32-27, writes Tony Pomeroy.

Tries from Arg Saliarelis, Rob Allen and Lovejoy Chawatama saw Albion race into a 24-3 lead after just 25 minutes, before the home side imploded; conceding twice in the final minutes of the opening forty.

Stu Heal added twelve points from the boot, but it wasn't enough for Bridgwater, who took a consolation losing bonus point.

Two early charge-downs put Bridgwater under enormous pressure and Ollie Phillips put the visitors ahead with a simple penalty before missing another kickable chance.

Bridgwater then showed a lot of class as Rob Allen scythed through the visiting defence - when he was stopped, the ball was cycled left and Arg Sarliarelis got the first try of the afternoon, converted by Heal.

On ten minutes, Allen again broke through from 30m to score under the posts. Heal again converted and also added a penalty on the quarter hour.

The third try came on 23 minutes when prop Lovejoy Chawatama burst through from 30m to score at the posts and Heal's conversion made it 24-3.

Philip narrowed the gap for Cleve with a penalty, before Bridgwater imploded in the final minutes of the half.

First, a loose kick out of defence was taken by Neil Evans who handed on to Greg Welling on half way.

The winger, who ran hard all afternoon, powered through some woeful tackling to score with Philip converting.

Minutes later, he repeated the dose when he appeared from a driving maul and dropped over the line. Philip's conversion - in off the far post -made the half time score 24-20.

Bridgwater had numerous chances to score in the second half - the penalty count in the half was 10-2 in Bridgwater's favour - but poor decision-making cost them time and again.

Even when visiting skipper, Brad Horman, was sent to the bin, they could not make the extra numbers count.

Cleve took the lead midway through the half when replacement Tom Gollop scored an unconverted try in the corner.

The lead was increased minutes later when a Bridgwater clearing kick was charged down by replacement Steve Bush who hacked on and won the race to touchdown.

Bridgwater gained a bonus point late on with another Heal penalty. Cleve players were delighted when the final whistle blew.

Albion travel to Clevedon next week, KO 3pm.

Bridgwater Team Ashley Honeywell, Joel Clark, Rob Allen, Matt House, Arg Saliarelis, Stu Heal, Roger Drabble, Lovejoy Chawatama, Matt Hastie, James Bryant, Rob Thompson, Ali Blundell, Tayler Buller, Ollie Dunn, Dan Kemmish (Capt) Replacements - all unused - Joe Stradling, Sam Knights, George Sluman Referee: Wayne Davis (Somerset Society)