South West 1 West
North Petherton 54, Teignmouth 13

NORTH Petherton moved to within four points of local rivals Bridgwater & Albion as a result of their comprehensive victory over Teignmouth at Beggars Brook on Saturday.

Pethy scored eight tries in all, with Damian Griffin getting the ball rolling by going over early on.

Sam Williams went over for the next score to begin his 24-point haul (made up of two tries and seven conversions), while James Taylor scored a hat-trick on a productive afternoon for the home side.

Mac Taylor and Henry Gliddon rounded off the scoring for the hosts to leave their Devon-based opponents still firmly in relegation danger.

Pethy are without a game this weekend, but they return to action with a trip to fellow lower mid-table outfit Bideford on Saturday, March 24.

South West 1 West

Matson 29, Bridgwater & Albion 7

BRIDGWATER and Albion travelled up the M5 to Gloucester where they were greeted with the news that the main pitch at Matson RFC was unplayable and that their game had been transferred to a very heavy and considerably sloping one nearby, writes Richard Walsh.

The Albion welcomed Garryn Basson back for his first match since injury early on in the campaign and Roger Drabble, making his first appearance of the season.

The visitors won the toss and chose to play up the hill first, which turned out to be the wrong call as the home side - motivated by the threat of relegation - adapted far better to the conditions

Matson came out of the traps all guns blazing at the start and in the opening 12 minutes ran in three tries, two of which were converted, to put them 19-0 up.

This barrage of tries acted as a wake up call to the visitors and the rest of the half was evenly contested, with no addition to the score.

With the slope in their favour after the break, Bridgwater came out strongly and following a period of sustained pressure in which their scrum dominated, as it did for most of the match, they were awarded a penalty try.

Bridgwater competed strongly for the rest of the game but were unable to exploit the slope as their efforts began to tell.

In the closing minutes Matson ran in two more unconverted tries to make it 29-7 at the final whistle.

Bridgwater and Albion: Matt Ranson, Sam Adcock, Craig Blyde, Ethan Trebble- Westlake, Arron Kelly, Bryan Webb, Ollie Dunn, Brad Talbot, Tom Fournier, Stuart Heal, Garryn Basson, Jay Owens, Rob Gurnett, Kyran Devitt, and Roger Drabble.

Replacements all used- Jerry Phillips, George Sluman and Ollie Phillips.

Afterwards, director of rugby Geoff Sluman said: “Tactically we did the right things, but we were very disappointed to lose in the way that we did.

“Maston looked like a team who were playing as though their lives depended on it whereas we took a little while to get going at the start.

“Our scrummaging was dominant and worked pretty well throughout, in fact our try was awarded as a result of the pressure we created.

“The effort that everybody put in during the game was excellent and everybody worked really hard for the good of the team, because it was a pretty un-glamorous match on a heavy pitch.

“At the end of it all we worked hard but it wasn’t our day. On a difficult pitch we didn’t adapt to it as well as Matson did.”