Falmouth

Last season an away defeat to Falmouth virtually put paid to Teignmouth’s promotion chances, and in both matches against last week’s visitors the Teigns struggled against a superior pack. How things have changed this year! Teignmouth remain top of the league with almost half of the season gone, and their success has been built on solid forward performances.
Coach Simon Morrell and captain Colin Aldworth have organised the forwards into an impressive unit, and they were so completely dominant on Saturday that a bonus point victory was wrapped up within 3 minutes of the start of the second half. Indeed, after only 9 minutes Aldworth had added two tries to his already impressive total for the year, and he is now seriously challenging Will Sowden for the title of Top Try Scorer.
Sowden was one of several regulars who had taken advantage of what was originally a blank weekend for the club, but such is the strength in depth at the club that the up-and-coming youngsters like Josh Davey and Roy Jones fitted in seamlessly while others such as Dan Force and Ben Parrett played in unfamiliar positions without damaging the team’s efficiency.
Despite this reorganisation, the dominance of the home side was so complete that almost all of the first half was played in the Cornishmen’s 22, and only heroic defending by the visitors and some rather strange decisions by the referee prevented Teignmouth from being out of sight long before half time. On several occasions the ball was carried over the try line, but the referee seemed unable to determine whether it had been grounded; on one occasion he complained of “not having X-ray vision” and on another was unable to make a decision as he fell over!
Despite this rather comic interlude it was only a matter of time before the lead was extended, and in injury time the home pack got yet another shove on in the scrum and veteran number 8 Mark Annal finally touched down in full view of the referee, to give the Teigns a 15-0 lead.
Being on the back foot for so long was always likely to lead to Falmouth running out of steam long before full time, and sure enough Teignmouth’s excellent level of fitness began to tell almost immediately in the second half as last year’s Player of the Season Pete Parsons added the all-important fourth try in the 43rd minute to ensure a bonus point.
From then onwards it was just a matter of how large the margin of victory would be. Eventually the Teigns backs managed to get into the action as first full-back Davey burst into the line and touched down under the post, and then regular scorer Chris Tidman added the sixth try. Dan Force, who had been struggling with his place kicking up till now, was grateful that both tries were scored virtually under the posts allowing him a couple of simple conversions at last.
Falmouth really never at any time threatened to cross Teignmouth’s line, but with the score at 34-0 they finally began to enjoy a period of possession and got themselves on the scoreboard with a Tom Spiller drop goal, a score which was indicative of how limited their ambitions were by this stage.
Although Teignmouth took their foot off the gas in the last 10 minutes, they were still controlling the game quite easily, and in injury time replacement Roy Jones got on the end of a fine passing movement to complete the scoring.
Morrell was pleased that, having had to re-shuffle his team, the momentum which has been building all season was able to be maintained, especially against a team which had posed his charges so many problems last season. Next week’s match away to Hayle will see the half-way point of the season reached – the coach will be hoping that this momentum can carry the side through what should be a tougher proposition than that posed by Falmouth.