RUGBY: Reading Abbey 27 Trowbridge 29 (From Wiltshire Times)

RUGBY: Reading Abbey 27 Trowbridge 29

10:00am Monday 30th November 2009

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TROWBRIDGE travelled to Reading Abbey on Saturday and came away with a narrow but fully deserved victory. An entertaining game saw the lead constantly change hands and the result in doubt right up to the final whistle.

However, considering their dominance in the forwards and territorial advantage, the Trowbridge coaches will be concerned that the winning margin was so small.

From the start the visitors applied pressure and an early Lloyd Davis penalty attempt went wide.

Shortly afterwards Trowbridge took the lead after a lineout win saw prop Sean Jones crash over the line in the corner for the opening try.

Davis was short with the conversion attempt but all of the play was going the way of the Green Lane outfit in the early exchanges.

However, a mixture of handling errors, poor decision making and the excellent Abbey defence prevented further scores.

On the one occasion the home side worked their way into the visitors' half, fly-half Jim Dye kicked a drop goal.

Trowbridge were soon on the attack again and were awarded a penalty right in front of the home posts. Instead of taking the easy three points they elected to run the ball.

A passing error resulted in an interception to allow speedy winger Tom Burns to run the length of the field to score a try, converted by full back Tom Waterhouse.

Again Trowbridge stormed back through their forwards, who were securing a stream of possession.

Sam Edwards worked his way over the line for what looked a perfectly good try, but the referee was unsighted and awarded a scrum.

It was not long before the visitors levelled the scores through a pushover try, scored by Matt Howard, Davis again missing the conversion.

Almost from the restart Trowbridge allowed Abbey back into the game and conceded a soft try to back row Henry Williams, converted by Waterhouse, to give the home team a 17-10 half-time lead.

Trowbridge introduced new Trinidadian second row signing Nigel Arismandez for the injured James Lawes, but an early error gave Abbey a further penalty converted by Waterhouse.

Despite this setback Trowbridge always looked in control, with their forwards securing a plentiful supply of possession.

Unfortunately, they could not turn their dominance into points.

On the one occasion the backs did click, they created a well worked try for winger Ashley Chalk which was unconverted.

Soon after Mark Durant crossed the line for what looked to be the equalising score, except the referee again deemed the ball to be held up.

Trowbridge finally got their reward when Shane Johnstone scored from a pushover, this time Davis making no mistake with the conversion to give the visitors the lead at 22-20.

Just when the visiting supporters thought Trowbridge would press ahead, yet another error resulted in the home winger Burns out pacing the visiting defence to give Abbey the lead again.

The conversion kicked by Waterhouse gave the home team a 27-22 lead.

With time running out Abbey went down to 13 men when they lost another prop forward through injury, the referee awarding uncontested scrums which meant one of their players had to leave the field as there was no replacement prop.

Abbey also suffered their third sin-binning offence and it proved too much.

The constant attacking pressure finally took its toll, allowing Trowbridge to score the winning try through Nick Little, converted by a jubilant Lloyd Davis.

On Saturday, Trowbridge entertain Buckingham at Green Lane.

MORE RUGBY REPORTS & PICTURES IN FRIDAY'S WILTSHIRE TIMES

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