Rugby Round-Up

DESPITE a spirited showing in the capital Newcastle Emlyn were defeated for the fifth time on the bounce when going down 24-17 against Cardiff Met in the Swalec Championship while Crymych completed back-to-back defeats when losing 36-27 against Llanelli Wanderers in League 1 West.

The one bright spot was at King George V Playing Field in Cardigan where Llyr Griffiths and colleagues sprang a thrilling 23-22 win over previously unbeaten Haverfordwest and in the process knocked the Blues off the top of Division 3 West A.

Not for the first time this term EMLYN conceded a significant amount of points early on and failed to claw back the deficit.

Right winger Ashley Taylor collected a lobbed pass to go in for a try, loose head prop and skipper Will Norton drove over from a lineout and centre Miles Moorhouse also got in on the scoring act, the latter score converted by outside half George Simpson.

Refusing to capitulate, the visitors fought back and prop Gethin Davies charged over for a try converted by winger Daniel Davies.

The try of the match saw the ball transferred through a number of Emlyn hands for Daniel Davies to offload to left-winger Llyr Jones who ran in for a score converted by Davies.

With the scores level the students upped the tempo and sprang three tries by Moorhouse, left-winger James Beal and lock Alex Dombrand, one of the scores converted by Moorhouse.

Former CRYMYCH favourite Dyfan Dafydd at outside half and No. 8 Brynmor Jones impressed for the visitors.

Crymych trailed by 12 points after the opening 40 minutes, their points coming from tries by scrum-half Luke Rogers and centre Carwyn Phillips, both converted by the latter.

For Llanelli, hooker Ben Harries, fullback Steffan Marshall and centre Jonathan Griffiths got tries, two of which were converted by outside half Jonathan Morgan.

After the break flanker Joe Powell and lock Andrew Phillips notched tries for the visitors, both converted by Rogers.

But Wanderers sprang further tries through centre Rhydian Morgan converted by fly-half Morgan who also landed a penalty.

There was some consolation for the north Pembrokeshire villagers who picked up a bonus point for scoring four tries.

Prolific points scorer Iestyn Crompton became the hero for CARDIGAN as the outside half did a Dan Biggar in slotting a late match-winning penalty.

Haverfordwest went ahead with a try by centre Dan Richards and he crossed for a second time before the oranges while scrum-half Aaron Evans and fullback Alun Jenkins notched tries for the Cardis.

A second half unconverted try by fullback Danny Morgan appeared to have secured victory for the visitors until Crompton took a hand.