Match report courtesy of Martin Easton....
Three tries in each half against rock bottom Harborne saw KC’s record a routine but somewhat uneventful bonus point win,their fourth in the opening six matches of the season,and they now lie fourth in Mids 2 West (N) with twenty two points from a possible thirty.
From an early scrum on halfway KC’s went through the phases and monopolised possession before eventually knocking on but play was brought back for a Harborne offside and the penalty was kicked to touch.From the five metre throw veteran Layton Wilkinson,starting in the second row rather than his usual No 8 position and causing problems all afternoon with his powerful carries,went over and his try was well converted by scrumhalf Freddie Morgan for a 7-0 lead after only seven minutes.
Kidder continued to dominate and created space for left wing Lawrence Hughes and although his attempted sleight of hand offload to the inside support went forward to give Harborne a scrum,a mighty shove by KC’s pack put the hosts under pressure.Their weak relieving clearance kick was run back at them by fullback Andy McLellan and after some good interplay between forwards and threes the No 15 ran a nice line to cross for a try which Morgan improved to double the advantage with a quarter of an hour played.
Midway through the half a tackle by flyhalf George Morgan on KC’s ten metre line dislodged the ball and he reacted quickly to snap it up and run clear down the left touchline and then round under the posts to make the conversion a formality for his brother Freddie,increasing the lead to 21-0.
Although Harborne were up against it,they continued to work hard and enjoyed periods of decent possession but always in areas of the pitch where they could not hurt the visitors and they could make little headway against Kidder’s well organised defence.A succession of long kicks by McLellan and George Morgan kept them well away from KC’s posts and halftime arrived without the home side ever remotely looking like troubling the scorers.
Just four minutes into the second period No 10 Morgan darted over from a smartly taken tap penalty for the bonus point try and eight minutes later a quickly taken throw and a penetrating kick by McLellan again caught Harborne’s defence napping.They managed to scramble back to slow down the attack but KC’s forwards took the ball on and prop Matt Rigsby’s pass put Alex Baldwin over for a fifth try,again improved by Freddie Morgan to stretch the lead to 33-0.
With twenty minutes played Harborne at last got a sniff of the tryline for the very first time when their right wing was tackled without the ball whilst trying to chase his own kick and the penalty was put into touch for a five metre lineout.The brief threat fizzled out but KC’s were going off the boil until,after a pretty flat fifteen minutes when nothing very much happened,they sparked back to life with a surge from a lineout on halfway which took play into Harborne’s 22.Freddie Morgan charged down an attempted clearance kick to put the hosts in more trouble and Rigsby took advantage of their disarray to power over for another try which Morgan converted with his fifth successful kick out of six.
With time running out and Kidder down to thirteen men with two players lying injured Harborne almost snatched a consolation try when their left wing made a dash down his touchline but he was tackled into touch just short of the flag and the hosts finished pointless.
KC’s had done enough to win comfortably against a plucky but limited side and although they probably should have run up a few more points they will have been very happy to keep a clean sheet away from home.However,they now face a very challenging month with successive fixtures against the three sides above them and a cup tie against Spartans (Midlands) who are currently second in Mids 2 West (S) and when they emerge from that run of matches they will be able to make a realistic appraisal of how their season is progressing.