Hartpury 41   Cornish Pirates 26

Playing Hartpury away in their third Premiership Cup game in Pool E of the competition, the Cornish Pirates held a fully deserved 19-10 halftime lead. However, it was one unfortunately relinquished in what was a frustrating second forty.

Both teams were seeking a first win in the Cup this year, Hartpury having lost 31-26 at home to Gloucester in their opener and then 54-3 away to Exeter Chiefs. As for the Cornish Pirates, they had lost 68-7 at home to the Chiefs and then narrowly 36-28 away to Gloucester.

For the Pirates there were five changes in their starting line-up from the one that ran out against the ‘Cherry & Whites’ at Kingsholm. Fly-half Iwan Jenkins and hooker Sol Moody – a two tries scorer against Gloucester – were making their first starts of the season, whilst Arthur Relton returned on the wing in place of Matt McNab who, along with Charlie McCaig, formed a fresh centre partnership.

With the main grass pitch declared unplayable at the home team’s 4ED Hartpury Stadium (named in honour of the charity set up by ex-Gloucester lock Ed Slater to raise awareness of motor neurone disease), it was agreed to play the game on an adjacent 3G pitch, where home fly-half Harry Bazalgette kicked the game off. Along with skipper and hooker Will Crane, and number 8 Jarrard Hayler, he was one of three former Pirates in their side. Also, of general interest, selected in Hartpury’s squad were five players who featured for Gloucester against the Pirates at Kingsholm just two weeks previously.

With ‘Storm Bert’ making an impact, the wet and windy conditions would inevitably make it difficult for both teams. However, the Pirates got off to an encouraging start when in the 10^th minute, with the wing pairing of Robin Wedlake and Arthur Relton taking play to the blind side, it was scrum-half Cam Jones who lent support to score to the left of the posts. Fly-half Iwan Jenkins added the extra two points

It was a good opening quarter for the Pirates, and one that all but from the restart proved even better, as disrupting Hartpury’s possession and with McCaig firing off a fine wide pass, it led to the ball being fed inside to full-back Will Trewin to score an unconverted try.

Hartpury strived to get into the match, with the Benz-Salomon twins Aristot and Jon, who had both played for Gloucester against the Pirates, very much to the fore. The Cornish side was though hungry to score again and following good play from skipper Hugh Bokenham and lock Charlie Rice, further influential support from McCaig saw a nudge that led to Relton taking advantage of a cross-field kick to gather and score. Jenkins was on target with his second conversion of the afternoon and thoughts of a possible bonus point fourth try quickly came to mind. We would see.

Conditions may well have been miserable, but for the boys from the Mennaye, and their supporters, the elements for the present mattered not.

As the game developed, and of no real surprise, Hartpury started to show glimpses of what they had to offer. Their Cornwall scrum-half Mike Austin was a busy performer, and a try scored by Aristot Benz-Salomon and converted by Bazalgette reminded all that the home team still posed a real threat.

In the build to the break, the Pirates were forced into giving too many penalties away and, taking the opportunity to chance a kick at goal in the last minute, Bazalgette duly delivered for the whistle to blow with the score now reading 10-19.

Once again this was a game too close to call, as an interesting second forty lay in wait. Interesting? Probably, but the start was anything but wanted by the Pirates, as Austin took advantage of some untidy play to run clear and score. Bazalgette duly converted, and the deficit was now just two points.

Maintaining pressure on the Pirates, another converted try scored by Crane saw Hartpury take a lead which was then extended on the hour mark when wing Ollie Holliday crossed out wide for their bonus point fourth. Bazalgette struck a fine conversion to see the scoreboard transformed, 31-19.

Conditions just got worse, but the Pirates quickly hit back thanks to their own bonus point providing try scored by skipper Bokenham, which was well converted by replacement Bruce Houston. However, the seven points were soon cancelled out when Hartpury’s final try of the match was scored by Hayler. Bazalgette again converted and then near the very end slotted his second penalty to give him an overall tally of 16 points in the match.

Speaking at the end of this contest, Cornish Pirates’ joint head coach Gavin Cattle commented:

“Firstly, looking at the first half we started well and created a good platform to take the game away from them. However, we then came out in the second half and just gifted them momentum, which was obviously disappointing.

“To sum up where we are as a team we are in that messy middle at present, where we see certain elements of our game improving and others less so. We can look at things tactically, whilst there were too many errors, lapses in discipline, and other things that we need to look at, learn from, and work on.

“I thought our lineout was better in difficult conditions, and when riding a wave in the first half we looked dangerous and sharp off turnover, and our set piece held its own. As for the second half, the start was disastrous and we lost momentum, which is difficult to get back. It is part of our learning and comes with experience, and unfortunately the reality is that we gave them a tsunami of momentum for them to take advantage of.

“We will look back at the game on Monday with a view to learning and striving to fix what we can. Much has been learnt from these Cup games, everyone is doing their utmost, and we now look forward to the return of league rugby where we need a win.”

Hartpury:   15 Alex Morgan 14 Brad Denty 13 Jack Johnson (22 Josiah Edwards-Giraud, 68) 12 Robbie Smith (23 Morgan Adderley Jones, 62) 11 Ollie Holliday 10 Harry Bazalgette 9 Mike Austin (21 Matty Jones, 73); 1 Aristot Benz-Salomon (17 Archie McArthur, 55) 2 Will Crane (captain; 16 Ethan Hunt 55) 3 Jon Benz-Salomon (18 Joe Rees, 70) 4 Cam Cobbett (19 Carn Richards-Farr, 63) 5 Jack Davies 6 Sam Lewis (20 Deian Gwynne, 65) 7 Harry Short 8 Jarrard Hayler.

Cornish Pirates:   15 Will Trewin 14 Robin Wedlake 13 Matt McNab 12 Charlie McCaig 11 Arthur Relton (23 Iwan Price-Thomas, 62) 10 Iwan Jenkins (22 Bruce Houston, 62) 9 Cam Jones (21 Dan Hiscocks, 46); 1 Billy Young (17 Oisin Michel, 62) 2 Sol Moody  3 James French (18 Jay Tyack, 62) 4 Charlie Rice (19 Matt Cannon, 62) 5 Eoin O’Connor 6 Josh King 7 Will Gibson (20 Tomi Agbongbon, 40) 8 Hugh Bokenham (captain).

Replacement (not used):   16 Harry Hocking.

Scorers:

Hartpury – tries: 1 Aristot Benz-Salomon (30) 9 Mike Austin (41) 2 Will Crane (53) 11 Ollie Holliday (60) 8 Jarrard Hayler (70); cons: 10 Harry Bazalgette (31, 42, 54, 61, 70); pens: 10 Harry Bazalgette (39, 78).

Cornish Pirates – tries:  9 Cam Jones (10) 15 Will Trewin (13) 11 Arthur Relton (22) 8 Hugh Bokenham (63); cons: 10 Iwan Jenkins (11, 23) 22 Bruce Houston (63).

Referee:   Charlie Gayther

Assistants:   Iain Kiy & Kevin Williams

Attendance:   Not given