Winscombe lost to Chew Valley, despite taking a narrow half-time lead.

Winscombe 17 pts

Chew Valley 31 pts

WINSCOMBE got off to a bad start, conceding a try within three minutes against Chew Valley.

Chew kicked into the Winscombe 22 and young full-back Tom Nock was isolated. The visitors regained possession and scored a converted try in the corner.

Winscombe responded with a try three minutes later. A penalty gave them a throw-in five metres out and Greg Brown’s catch was driven to the line by Simon Thompson and Louis Hooper scored in the corner, converted by James Carter.

Good pressure from Keiran Clarke, Dan Fryer, Chris Aske and Phil Peat earned a penalty which Carter converted for a 10-7 lead.

Good defence by Chew Valley kept Winscombe out and when the visitors broke out, they kicked a penalty to level the scores at 10-10 on the half-hour.

Just before the break, good play from Owen Howell, George House and Peat managed to set Nock clear and he scored a fine solo try, converted by Carter.

Winscombe’s lead looked insufficient as they turned to play up the slope and so it proved as Chew ran in three unanswered tries in the second half, the first within five minutes.

Their forwards, led by a strong back row, made powerful inroads and with their opponents not regrouping quickly enough touched down in the left corner.

The Chew full-back used a gaping hole on the blindside to score and a third try came after good work from Chew’s forwards created an overlap for their full-back.

During this period, Winscombe had twice been caught offside at rucks to concede six points from penalties, so they were 17-31 down with 15 minutes to play.

To Winscombe’s credit they produced a couple of reasonable attacks and despite being under pressure in the final minutes, still tried to break away for a goal that would have given them a losing bonus point.