Bridgwater 19 - Clevedon 24

This was a hard fought local derby and Clevedon, having beaten Bridgwater easily in the Somerset cup, expected a harsh response from the hosts Bridgwater and certainly got one. Bridgwater started well putting the Seasiders line under pressure and took an early lead with a well executed try from a five metre scrum, converted. Clevedon came back and levelled on the quarter hour, when Dean Ashfield touched down near the posts, converted by Kieran Hill to level the scores 7-7. Almost from the restart Hill put Clevedon ahead when he slotted home a long range penalty for 7-10. The Clevedon kicker then put Clevedon further ahead with another penalty for 7-13. Shortly after Clevedon had a player sent to the bin, but despite playing with 14 men, Bridgwater could not take advantage and just on the stroke of half time Clevedon were awarded a penalty just inside the Bridgwater half, which Hill kicked to take Clevedon into a 7-16 lead at the break.
The second half saw Clevedon playing into the wind and Bridgwater had most of the territorial advantage but Clevedon's defence held firm, after a long period in the Clevedon 22 Clevedon turned over the ball and good work by Matt Britton allowed young Harold Butland to sprint towards the half way line and offload to Cameron Maslen who out ran the Bridgwater defence to score a try in the corner, for 7-21. Clevedon should have been cruising going into the last quarter but Brigwater had other ideas and playing with their tails up they put the Seasiders under intense pressure and after working the ball wide, raced in for a try to pull the score back to 12-21. Minutes later, whilst a brawl ensued unnoticed by the referee, Bridgwater repeated the move and scored a converted try, to close the score to 19-21. With six minutes remaining on the clock and Bridgwater in the ascendency, the game could have slipped away from Clevedon but strong drives from Ben Purcell,Andy Davies and Dean Ashfield, resulted in a penalty award to Clevedon in midfield and the trusty boot of Kieran Hill saw them home for an epic win.
Head Coach Nick Hill commented "This was a very tough win away from home, we could have played better but that we didn't was largely down to the pressure Bridgwater put us under and right to the death it could have gone either way. What is good to see is that we are finding ways to win under pressure when our backs are against the wall"
Next Saturday Clevedon are home to Newent.k.o.3.p.m. v.p.'s lunch 1.30pm.