Hakes Win on the Road
Paignton 15 v 28 St Ives
Last Saturday the St Ives 1st team squad travelled to Devon side Paignton for their latest Western Counties West league game. Returning to the side for this match was joint head coach Rob Elloway (hooker), Sean Stevens (flanker) and, making his first start this season, Josh Palmer, on the wing. Rhys Brownfield moved to fly half with joint head coach Paul Thirlby out (hamstring). Cameron Bone was named among the replacements for his first appearance of the season.
Paignton started the game strongly and kept St Ives pinned back in their half for the first quarter of an hour. The pressure was converted into two tries, one of which was converted through Dave Siddall and Joel Taylor in the 4th and 10th minutes respectively to give Paignton an early 12 points to nil lead.
Despite the early pressure and points from the home side, St Ives were able to soak up the pressure and begin to exert their dominance up front. Once the St Ives scrum began to take control the whole game began to change. A catch and drive in the 19th minute saw second row Jamie Prisk dot the ball down at the back of a powerful St Ives maul. Rhys Brownfield kicked the difficult wide conversion. The Hakes were back in the game at 12 points to 7.
The home side briefly extended their advantage with a long range penalty in the 24th minute from Dave Siddall (15-7) but this was to be their last score of the match.
The pattern of the first half was set. St Ives continued to dominate up front with Paignton reduced to making counter attacks. In the 33rd minute St Ives found themselves deep in the Paignton 22 and from a ruck the St Ives scrum half, Sam Carter, crossed for a try. Brownfield provided the extras to put St Ives only a point behind the hosts at 15 - 14.
The final act of the first period saw a St Ives scrum push the home side back over their own line, allowing number 8, Martyn Lawrance, the chance to score the try. Brownfield converted again to make the half time score Paignton 15 St Ives 21.
The second half saw the home side defending for long periods, their only chance of points coming from a penalty in the 59th minute, which was missed.
St Ives continued to press home their advantage up front, but, to their credit, Paignton defended with passion to keep the Hakes at bay for most of the second half. The final score of the match came in the 68th minute when Jamie Prisk crossed for his second try of the match from close range. This secured a bonus point for the visitors. Rhys Brownfield, now with a success rate of 71% on conversions, completed an excellent afternoon with the boot when he kicked the additional points on offer to make the final score Paignton 15, St Ives 28.
This was a much better performance from St Ives who managed to put behind them the poor performance last time out at St Austell. In their next game the Hakes will need to be on top of their game when they travel to the only unbeaten side in the league, Kingsbridge, this coming Saturday. Kick off in Devon is scheduled for 3:00pm; any travelling support would be very welcome.
St Ives : Ben Taylor, Rob Elloway, Ben Jenkins, Jamie Prisk, John Lamsin, Harry Parton, Sean Stevens, Martyn Lawrance, Sam Carter, Rhys Brownfield, Peter Mabbott, Steve Kenward (Captain), Tom Nicholas, Josh Palmer, Grant Thirlby.
Replacements: Leigh Hocking, Tom Chandler, Cameron Bone (All used)
