ON Saturday Narberth welcomed Cardiff Met to the Lewis Lloyd Ground with the students sitting slightly above the Otters in the Premier League Table, writes Roberts Lewis.

Once again there was an excellent crowd in attendance and they were treated to a great standard of rugby with some superb individual tries scored by both teams during the match.

Narberth were first to get on the scoreboard when a driving lineout close to the visitors’ line saw hooker Jake Bowen sneak round the blindside from the rolling maul and run in close to the posts for a try converted by fly half Nico Setaro (7-0).

The visitors’ backline looked sharp and dangerous every time they had the ball and within minutes some slick handling saw the students break the Narberth defence and centre Hugh Moore scored an unconverted try in the top corner (7-5).

The game was evenly poised with Narberth getting the upper hand at scrum time but the students looking slightly better in open play.

After about 20 minutes Narberth were awarded a free kick around their ten metre line.

This was quickly taken by scrum half Lewys Gibby who raced up field and then threw a pass out wide to the supporting flanker Tom Powell.

He outpaced the covering defence and then shrugged off the attempted tackle by the Cardiff Met fullback to score an excellent try in the far corner converted by Setaro (14-5).

The visitors came back strongly and came close to scoring on several occasions but dogged defence from the whole Otters team was somehow managing to keep them out.

Then right on half time the visitors were awarded a penalty which they kicked to the clubhouse corner.

From the lineout they attempted a rolling maul but when this was stopped short of the line the Met scrum half picked up the ball and darted round the blindside for another unconverted try (14-10).

Ten minutes into the second half and the Otters were once again showing their dominance at the scrums.

When the visitors’ forwards were being driven back, Gibby picked up the ball and side-stepped past several defenders before diving over the line close to the posts for a great individual try converted by Setaro (21-10).

With 20 minutes left to play Narberth seemed to be in control of the game but within two minutes the whole match was turned on its head.

Firstly, Narberth Second Row Sam Martin was yellow carded for trying to intercept a visitors’ passing movement and from the ensuing lineout after the penalty had been awarded replacement flanker Will Boyde was also yellow carded for allegedly collapsing the rolling maul.

This left the Otters with only 13 men on the field. Cardiff Met called for a scrum close to the Otters line and their wing Toby Lock crossed for a try near the corner which wasn’t converted (21-15).

The Otters now had to play for another six minutes with 13 players but they managed to keep possession within their forwards for most of that time and even managed a penalty kicked by replacement fly half Jonathan Rogers to slightly extend their lead to 24-15.

In the last ten minutes when Narberth once again had a full compliment of players they finished the match in style with two well taken tries by left wing Harry Fuller.

The first when he ran down the touchline and cut inside the Met full back for an excellent try under the posts converted by Rogers and the second when he dived over in the clubhouse corner for an unconverted try bringing up the final score of 36-15 in favour of the Otters, much to the delight of the home supporters.