Yatton 17 Gordano 31

Gordano travelled to Yatton RFC knowing that they would need to be on top of their game to overcome a side full of confidence following 2 bonus point victories. The game started at a sprint with both sides looking to get the ball in to the wide channels as early as possible, for the first 10 minutes however defences were winning as some huge hits prevented either side from making any meaningful ground. Gordano won a penalty from a dominant scrum and fly half Joe Rowsal put the kick into the Yatton 22. The resulting line out was won and after several short sided phases scrum half Kaine Southey worked his way over the line to put the visitors 5 points up.

Yatton responded strongly and a well worked move off an attacking scrum 30m out put one of their centres into space and the cover defence could not prevent the try after some tidy offloads - the conversion was missed 5-5. Yatton remained in the ascendancy and worked a penalty kick of their own deep into the Gordano 22 - they were however unable to execute the set piece and the ball was thrown to Gordano second row Tom Arnal who made a half break before the ball was cleared and pressure relieved. This sparked Gordano in to life and through aggressive defence and some tidy breakdown work they managed to score two tries in 10 minutes both from driving mauls the first scored by tight head Tom Hollis and the second by blindside flanker Jack Thomas to leave the score at 5-17. It was Yatton that had the final say of the half when another flowing backs move put them in under the post for a 12-17 half time score.

The second half started as the first did with Gordano combining pace out wide with aggression in the tight resulting in Joe Rowsal touching down on the left after some neat handling from Jack Thomas. Gordano scored again on 50 minutes after a quick tap put Kaine Southey away who calmly drew the fullback to put Owen Abbot in under the posts - Joe Rowsal adding the extras.

Gordano lost a couple of players to head injuries and Tom Arnal to the bin after a succession of team infringements at the breakdown. Yatton did pull a try back which got the strong home crowd on their feet and behind their team, Yatton responded by turning down set pieces to run the ball from everywhere but the Gordano defence which had been superb all day held on for the victory. At a venue where they had struggled in previous years Gordano pulled off as complete a performance as they could have hoped for and move on to next weeks game against Taunton rightfully full of confidence.