Impressive Coventry get the better of Pirates

THE Cornish Pirates suffered a disappointing defeat against Coventry at the Nick Newbold Stadium on Saturday.

A fully contested affair was expected on the 4G synthetic pitch as the home side were naturally keen to bounce back from their 38-35 defeat to Rotherham Titans in their first league of the campaign.

Having got off to an impressive start against Doncaster in their season opener, the Pirates made some changes from the starting line-up the previous week.

Both centre Chester Ribbons and lock Steele Barker picked up injuries against the Knights, so Joe Elderkin was named to slot into the centre alongside Harry Ascherl. Tomi Agbongbon was selected at No. 8, with Hugh Bokenham this week moving up into the second row.

Unfortunately, further disruption occurred when Elderkin was injured in the warm-up, so Josh Radcliffe moved into the centre and Finn Love took his place on the wing. Sam Cahill took the vacated spot on the bench.

On a perfect September afternoon, the Pirates got off to an equally perfect start, scrum half Dan Hiscocks taking advantage of space to open the scoring for the second week running with a try which was converted by halfback Arwel Robson.

It was not long, however, before the Blue and Whites levelled matters, with a try scored by wing Jack Reeves. Adding the extras was former Pirates fly-half Bruce Houston.

In less than 20 minutes, the home outfit then added four more tries to their account, thanks to skipper and hooker Jordon Poole, Matt McNab, powerful centre Api Bavadra, and Welsh flanker Morgan Strong.

The Pirates then hit back with tries from lock Milo Hallam and prop Alessandro Heaney. The latter’s effort was converted by Robson, who also added two points right on half-time following a try by Ascherl. In between, Coventry lost former Exeter Chiefs scrum half Sam Maunder to the sin bin.

A 33-26 halftime scoreline suddenly looked a little healthier for the Pirates, but after the restart they would soon lose Robson and Matt Cannon, who was making his 50th appearance for the club.

Coventry then proceeded to add six more tries in the period, as Reeves and Poole each got on the scoresheet again besides tries from full-back Tom Bacon and replacements Dan Green, Josh Barton, and David Opoku-Fordjour.

In Coventry’s loss against Rotherham a week before, Houston, who recently featured for Zimbabwe, had scored a try and kicked five conversions, whilst in this encounter he again impressed with a tally of 18 points scored through nine successful conversions.

As for the Pirates, replacements Matt Pritchard and Jamie Clark each made it over the line for converted tries.

Cornish Pirates: 15 Henry Palmer, 14 Arthur Relton, 13 Josh Radcliffe, 12 Harry Ascherl, 11 Finn Love, 10 Arwel Robson, 9 Dan Hiscocks; 1 Alessandro Heaney, 2 Morgan Nelson, 3 Alfie Petch, 4 Milo Hallam, 5 Hugh Bokenham, 6 Alex Everett (captain), 7 Alex Forsythe, 8 Tomi Agbongbon.

Replacements: 16 Matt Pritchard, 17 Jamie Clark, 18 Osman Dimen, 19 Matt Cannon, 20 Josh King, 21 Luke Ratcliff, 22 Will Becconsall, 23 Sam Cahill (not used).

Yellow cards: Robson, Cannon.

Tries: Hiscocks, Hallam, Heaney, Ascherl, Pritchard, Clark; cons: Robson (5).