Narberth 8 pts. Bridgend Ath. 21

Bridgend Athletic avenged their Swalec Welsh Cup exit at the hands of the Otters at Narberth in December with a comfortable win which ended the Otters' recent winning streak in league matches.

It was a thoroughly convincing win for the Athletic team, who used the ball more effectively than Narberth on the day and, despite their relative inexperience, proved to be more streetwise in the way the match was played.

Both teams play an expansive style of rugby, which makes good watching for spectators, but Athletic made fewer mistakes and made Narberth pay for any errors with a three-to-one try count.

Stephen Lewis, who had a good all round game for the visitors at number 10, gave his team the lead with a try in the first minute after a superb move by the Bridgend Athletic backs. Lewis also added the two points from the conversion kick.

Narberth supporters had something to cheer about when fullback Roger Davies came into the line to finish off a good handling movement three minutes later with an unconverted try in the left corner.

When Athletic hooker Stuart Nation was yellow-carded after 12 minutes there was every hope that the Otters could make the disparity in numbers count.

It was not to bem as unfortunately for Narberth supporters, it was the visitors who scored the next try, despite being a player short.

It was another invigorating move by the Athletic threequarters, with excellent work by centre Rob Coles which ended in a try for wing Aaron Warner when he cut inside on a diagonal run and Stephen Lewis converted.

In first half injury time, Otters' outside-half Craig Jones received a yellow card from the referee for remarks made after a penalty had been awarded to Bridgend Athletic.

In the second half, the Otters made a far better fist of proceedings, but still could not make the necessary breakthrough to get back into the game. Athletic scored their third converted try when full-back Matthew Hathaway came into the line to exploit an overlap on the left.

Hathaway touched down for a try in the left corner and Lewis held his nerve to convert and the Otters were unable to make any further impression on the match result during the last 20 minutes of play.

Folly Farm Balcony Suite match sponsors, DP Building Supplies, of Llanboidy, and Otters' Holt match sponsors, Dorian Phillips Building Contractors, also of Llanboidy, selected Narberth prop Justin Hughes as man-of-the-match for his committed all-round display.

The match ball sponsor was J. O. Griffiths, Butchers, of High Street, Narberth.

Commenting to Observer Sport after the match, Otters' forwards coach Sean Gale said: "As coaches we were bitterly disappointed with the result. Bridgend Athletic came to play a good game of rugby with a very young and enthusiastic team, but at Narberth we should have been able to cope with that.

"What upset me more than anything was that our one-on-one tackling was very poor and was totally unacceptable. After the problems at Builth the previous week, we had worked hard on tackling in training, but we still let in some silly tries.

"In addition, we were turned over in the contact area and the way we played we did not deserve to win.

"Admittedly we created some chances as our driving line-out was good, as was the scrum, but we did not make possession of the ball count. As a result, Bridgend Athletic fully deserved to win today.

"On an individual front, flanker Chris Scarf and prop Justin Hughes both worked hard, but when you make as many mistakes as we did, with dropped passes, poor passing and missed tackles, we did not deserve to get anything out of the match.

"We must have a good hard look at ourselves in training in order to come back and show some character against Cwmllynfell in our next league match on Friday evening."

Narberth fielded: Roger Davies, Nick Jones, Richard Davies (capt.), John Leyshon, Mark Heywood, Craig Jones, Andrew Davies, Tom Slater, Dan Smith, Justin Hughes, Chris James, Jason Jennings, Chris Scarf, Simon Griffiths and Colin Davies.

Replacements: Aled Harries, Alex Jenkins, Sean Lloyd, Adrian Killa and Tom Bonnell.