U 13s Devon Cup

The young Cockles came to this match on the back of some very good performances in the warm up games and having played a major part in the Exmouth Community College team which comfortably defeated Honiton College in mid week therefore were optimistic of progressing through to the next round.

It only took a few minutes for Exmouth to settle into their stride and in the first half ran in 5 tries, courtesy of Ben Dawson, Richard Forrest, Vinnie Neath Rogers, Luke Davis & Harry Sprague. All but one of the tries were successfully converted by the faithful boot of Dawson.

At half time coach Mike Sprague emptied the bench and used all the replacements which predictably unsettled things for a few minutes and during this time Honiton gained some territory and were awarded a penalty 5 metres from the cockles line. This was taken quickly and Exmouth were judged to have not fully retreated when they regained possession so another penalty this time the visitors had numbers behind the ball to secure what was to be their only score of the afternoon.

Exmouth were not going to let this set back disrupt their game and from the restart the Honiton player receiving the high ball was swallowed up by several Exmouth shirts and as a bonus the Cockles managed to secure the ball in the ensuing ruck for Scrum Half Stewart Masters to spin the ball quickly to Dawson who’s pace caught Honiton flat footed and he raced through to score under the posts. With confidence restored Exmouth came straight back at Honiton again and when the ball bobbled loose out of Honiton hands Masters showed great footballing skills to hack the ball on and appeared to be pulled back by the shirt when the ball didn’t bounce kindly for him, however Owen Tidball who is always there when needed gathered and wriggled his way over in the corner.

The match was brought to an early conclusion when Dawson broke from midfield to score again. With Exmouth leading by 52 points to 5 the referee stopped the game. Man of The Match award went to Luke Davis who was relentless in defence and showed great imagination in attack causing Honiton many problems.