North Bristol 26 – 20 Cirencester RFC

CIRENCESTER suffered a shock defeat at bottom club North Bristol.

Andy Deacon's side had previously won four games on the spin and their bad day at the office was compounded when influential fly-half Oliver Newman broke his leg in the second-half.

The game started with the Bristol club dominating the possession and putting the squeeze on in the scrum, with so much possession it was inevitable that they would take the lead which they did with two well taken tries. This stirred the away side into action with scrum-half Josh Woodward try, who sniped down the blindside to score, making the score 14-5.

Ciren were then winning the territory battle but were wasteful in possession making too many unforced errors, they were rewarded with a Mike Howell penalty though clawing the deficit back to 14-8 at half- time. Ciren needed to start well in the second half to build on the momentum gained in the latter stages of the first half, but the home side hit back with another two tries of their own taking the score to 26-8 with twenty minutes to go. Ciren`s hopes of victory were then taken another blow, when Newman broke his leg. To the players credit they fought hard to the end scoring two further tries through captain Oliver Gibson and Darren Stephens, making the final score 26-20, with Ciren earning a losing bonus point.

Noah Newman took the player of the match award.

Top-of-the-table Old Cryptians RFC visit on Saturday.

Cirencester RFC 2nd team drew with Cheltenham RFC 2nds 7-7 in their latest District League One match. With Cirencester dominating the scrum and possession without having that accuracy to score further tries and register what would have been a well-deserved victory.