HARLOW KEEPS BOURNVILLE ON COURSE WITH A MASTERFUL DISPLAY

Bournville maintained their challenge on the summit of Midlands One West with a convincing home victory over Camp Hill on Saturday. After the cancellation of the previous week’s game against Nuneaton Old Edwardians, Director of Rugby Rob Sigley was able to name a strong side to face their local rivals. Nick Southern regained his place at number eight and Chris Humphrey was welcomed back to the bench after returning to peak fitness following injury.

Bournville started strongly despite the muddy conditions and the forward pack led by the robust front row of Ian Coles, Dean Bick and Paul Coles began to dominate proceedings. Hooker Bick opened the scoring with a try from a Bournville driving maul deep in Camp Hill territory. The Bournville lead was soon extended when Ian Coles capitalised on some more good forward play to burrow over from close range giving Bournville a 10-0 lead.

Despite Bournville’s dominance, Camp Hill came back into the game on the half-hour mark. Successive penalties allowed Camp Hill to get a foothold in the game and bring the score back to 10-6. However, with the half drawing to a close, scrum-half Robbie Harlow found space around a ruck to dart over for Bournville. Alex Warner’s successful conversion put Bournville 17-6 ahead at the break.

The second half began in much the same fashion as Harlow, who was enjoying an excellent afternoon, put Patrick Faamu into space for the centre to crash over. Another successful Warner conversion put the home side out of reach at 24-6.

With the conditions underfoot deteriorating as the game failed to ignite into the spectacle the vocal home support were hoping for, Bournville were unable to capitalise on their territorial advantage and Camp Hill also had some chances of their own. However, it was Bournville who had the last word when replacement winger Chris Humphrey scored under the posts following a fine offload from second-row Steve Smith. Warner added the conversion and gave Bournville the 31-6 victory.

After the game, Director of Rugby Rob Sigley commented, “It was pleasing to get a good performance under our belts after the recent disruption because of the weather. We’ve still got some areas we need to improve on but we’re starting to piece things together. Next week will be another tough game so we’ll be looking to carry on our improvement.”

Bournville Starting line-up: 1. Paul Coles, 2. Dean Bick, 3. Ian Coles, 4. Steve Smith, 5. Rob Griffin, 6. Adam Cristol, 7. Tom McIntosh, 8. Nick Southern, 9. Robbie Harlow, 10. Alex Warner, 11. Iestyn Pratt, 12. Patrick Faamu, 13. Carl Colvin, 14. Adam Coniff, 15. Jon Ball, 16. Rob Sigley, 17. Chris Humphrey, 18. Mike Holmes.