Luctonians 17, Blaydon 7
A much changed Blaydon side made a 550 mile round trip for their first ever encounter with the Herefordshire side and in a tight game were within 2 minutes of gaining a bonus point only to come away empty-handed.
Conditions were far from ideal, deep mud and driving rain making scoring opportunities few and far between. By the interval Lewis Silver the Luctonians scrum-half had put over a couple of penalties to give his side a 6 points advantage and then landed 2 more after the break.
At 12-0 Blaydon were far from out of it however and after defending well finally woke up and put some decent moves together. Success was eventually gained when winger Dan Marshall made a lot of ground with a typical barnstorming run with full-back Nathan Bailey on hand to finish off.
Joe Whyman’s conversion took the deficit to just 2 points with 15 minutes left on the clock and Blaydon sensibly kept it tight with a losing bonus in mind. Four minutes into time added on however they chose to run it toward the home 22, lost possession and could only watch on as Luctonians hacked it downfield for Adam Knight to cross for a try.
John Brennan