Match report courtesy of Brian Pinner...

KCRFC secured a comfortable bonus point victory against previously unbeaten Veseyans in this league fixture, and showed a vast improvement in their discipline compared with previous games.

KCs attacked from the start, and won an early penalty at the first scrummage, which was kicked into the corner for a line out near the Veseyans line. The pack won clean ball and drove forward, scrum half and skipper Chris Pinner spotted a gap on the blind side and he darted over in the corner for the first try, after just 4 minutes. Unfortunately he broke a bone in his hand as he scored the try and had to leave the field a few minutes later.

The reshuffle of the backs did not disrupt KCs’ play, and the forwards continued to dominate the scrums. After 13 minutes Rhys Pritchard made a clean break, and when he was stopped short of the line Will Varley continued the move to score out wide for the second try.

Veseyans started to come into the game at this stage, and had two long range penalty attempts that narrowly missed the posts. Solid KCs defence kept the opposition away from their try line, until, on 30 minutes, a penalty was awarded for a late tackle, which was converted to make the score 10 – 3 in the home team’s favour.

Veseyans had a player sent to the sin bin for an infringement at a ruck, and KCs nearly took advantage when Steve Price made a strong run for the line, offloading to Joe Nicklin who could not quite get the ball down. With the final play of the half Veseyans showed they were not out of the game with a fine blind side break from their scrum half. Replacement full back Sam Taylor put in a try saving tackle however, and Varley cleared the ball into touch.

KCs started the second half in the same vein as the first, and could have scored two more tries in as many minutes. Nathan Small was held up over the line, and then an overlap in the backs was not spotted and another attack came to nothing.

Neither side was able to gain momentum as they both lost possession on a number of occasions in the tackle area. KCs were not able to clear out the defenders, and had the ball stolen on a few occasions, while Veseyans ran into a solid defensive wall and were help up in the tackle to give KCs the ensuing scrummage.

15 minutes into the half KCs turned their possession into points when Josh Winfield made good ground down the wing, Freddie Morgan made a clean break on the 10 metre line and then handed on to Varley for his second try of the match. As they had done the previous week KCs counter attacked straight from the kick off, with the forwards breaking tackles and offloading to create space for Freddie Morgan to hand on to his brother George to charge over under the posts for the bonus point try, Freddie adding the conversion for a 22 – 3 lead.

Full credit to Veseyans, who refused to give up, and they forced KCs onto the defensive for the next 10 minutes. The KCs’ tackling was strong, with Simon Clarke to the fore, but the pressure eventually told when the backs tried to run the ball out of defence, lost possession, and the Veseyans’ forwards took advantage to crash over under the posts to reduce the deficit to 22 – 10.

KCs raised their game for the final 15 minutes, and had a number of chances that on another day would have led to tries being scored. Price eventually capitalised on some more good handling after a quickly taken penalty to batter his way over the line to score the home side’s fifth try.

Injuries to the Veseyans front row meant the last 10 minutes of the game were played with uncontested scrums, which took away some momentum from the KCs’ forwards. They did create one final chance as Winfield again showed his pace on the wing, only to be tackled just short of the line and for his pass to be knocked forward by the supporting player. Final score KCs 27 points Veseyans 10 points.

A solid performance from KCs, who were never under too much pressure. However, they will need to be more clinical with their finishing in the tighter games ahead, starting with a North Midlands Shield Quarter Final next Saturday, at home to Shrewsbury (3:00pm kick off).