48 nil victory moves Avon up to 4th place

Minehead were actually a decent team but found Avon in rampaging form with the return of a few key players after injury. The visitors attacks floundered as Avon’s impressive line speed and energy in defence disrupted their rhythm whilst, as the game went on, Avon dominated more and more possession and territory.

Early probing runs from Dan Cousineau, Ian Burnell and Escher le Duc gave Avon good field position for Jonny Batchelor to open the scoring with a penalty. Then a great line and powerful run from man-of-the-match Ben May was halted just short of the line, leaving Kiddie Sheikh to pounce for the try with Batchelor slotting the kick.

Minehead showed their danger with a promising attack which was snuffed out in the corner by a fantastic covering tackle from Jack Moore. Meanwhile at the other end, Avon switched play to the blindside as a cut out pass from Sheikh found prop Chris Mutlow lurking on the wing for a 20 metre sprint to touch down in the corner.

This gave a 15 nil margin at the interval but in the second half Avon really cut loose with some flowing attacks to score another 5 tries. The first came just after Xander Hall-Davis had a try disallowed for leading with the forearm as he crashed over the line, instead resulting in a yellow card. The subsequent penalty for Minehead led to a lineout which they mismanaged, allowing Dan Griffin to take advantage to seize the loose ball for a simple try.

A tremendous counter attack launched by Moore from his own 22 saw the Avon supporting runners transfer the ball across field before being forced into touch by the Minehead defence. Shortly afterwards, Cousineau scored their bonus point try after another incisive break from scrum half Sheikh.

As Avon grew in confidence and increased their intensity, Kane Book spotted an opening on the narrow side from quick ruck ball to feed Le Duc who crashed over in the corner. Then Ben Hurd achieved an unique double. Having come off the bench to add dynamism in the last 10 minutes, he powered over after a 30 metre line out drive to score his second try of the day, having previously also scored for Avon’s 2nd team in their earlier match against Combe Down Vets.

With Minehead desperately trying to run the ball out of defence, Rob Fitch was rewarded for a controlled performance at fly half by nonchalantly intercepting a wayward pass and strolling over to score under the posts. Batchelor added another 4 successful conversions to notch up 13 personal points to celebrate his 100th 1st team appearance.