National Two (S)

Taunton Titans 26 Bury St Edmunds 22

TAUNTON Titans made it six bonus-point wins from six but were made to work hard for it by an excellent Bury St Edmunds side, writes Keith Brooking.

Tries from Nick Mason (2), Ben Turner and Jack Claydon gave Titans a 26-10 half-time lead, with the bonus-point already in the bag – but the visitors fought back to score 12 unanswered points in the second-half and push the league leaders all the way, with three yellow cards not helping the Bury cause.

The Titans got off to a flying start with two converted tries in the first 15 minutes.

The first was scored by centre Nick Mason who after over a dozen phases ghosted passed the defence to score under the posts.

The second came courtesy of second row Ben Turner, who cantered over following an impressive driving maul from the forward pack, that started on the Bury 22 metre line.  

Both of these were converted by Gary Kingdom to open a 14 point lead.

Bury then got their first points of the game when the Titans were down to 14 men following Barrie-John Chapman’s yellow card.

A penalty kicked by full-back Christopher Lord was followed by a try for hooker Beau Gibbson, which was converted by Lord to close the gap on the home side.

With the Taunton pack on top in the set piece, they scored two more tries before half-time.

First winger Jack Claydon went over in the corner after Taunton won a ball against the head, then Nick Mason scored his second of the game after fly-half Toby East intercepted inside his own 22 and raced up to half way to feed Mason who did the rest.

Kingdom added the extras to complete the Titans scoring for the day.

Bury St Edmunds scored a converted try within five minutes of the second-half thanks to Lord who converted his own try.

With the Titans penalty count rising and wrong options taken with the try line begging, the visitors gave themselves a great chance to claim the win, scoring their third try through flanker Sean Stapleton.

After the forwards domination in the first-half an unusual miss-firing lineout meant they couldn’t get any momentum or use the maul that was so affective in the first half.

With eight minutes of the game to go, the home side were left hanging on and scrambling defensively in their own 22.

The Titans had chances to close the game out, but once again gave away silly penalties as the visitors threw everything at them.

But the Titans held on, just.

Taunton Titans: 15 Kingdom (Capt), 14 Struminski, 13 Mason, 12 Fraser, 11 Claydon, 10 East, 9 Webb, 8 Chapman, 7 Frost, 6 Persey, 5 Turner, 4 Harvey, 3 Caulfield, 2 Spurdle, 1 Woolmore