Old Illtydians continued their excellent start to the season with another bonus point victory at home to Wattstown. It was the visitors who scored the first try to go 5-3 ahead after an early Cochlin penalty, crashing over after some strong carrying by their bulky forwards. That was as good as it got for the visitors in the first half, with 2 more Cochlin penalties putting the Illts back in front, before the home side cut loose with 4 tries in 20 minutes. Man of the match Jason Smith sliced through for the first, before a neat cross kick from Sean Cochlin allowed Ben McHardy to gather and put second row Daniel Molcher over for his second try of the season. Try machine Tom Wheeler went over at the posts for the third and after another cross kick from Cochlin was allowed to bounce, full back Campbell McMillan dotted down to make the score 33-5 at half time.
McHardy was next over the line profiting from a great offload from Wheeler. Some loose work at the base of the scrum while the Ilts had a man in the bin allowed the sharp Wattstown 9 to kick ahead and score and with a strong wind the visitors had their best spell of the match. The Illts defence held firm and broke from deep with Smith piercing the line and putting McMillan away for his second. The Illts added 2 further tries, the first from Cochlin after some lovely support play and offloading and the final try from skipper Phil Morse after a lovely exchange of passes with Adrien Noury.
The Illts seemed certain to round things off with a pushover try as they had the Wattstown scrum in reverse but the ball was shipped out to the backs and a dropped pass allowed Wattstown to hack through couple of times before an inviting bounce saw the visiting sub score under the posts. The try was converted to bring the score to 53-19.
Another good performance from the Illts with the pack again providing a very solid platform, allowing the backs to shine. Some of the handling and support play was superb, with Smith having his best game yet for the Illts, and the back 3 of Savager, McHardy and Mcmillan all running strongly. Another excellent outing for the halfbacks, with fly half Cochlin contributing another 18 points despite and off day with the boot and controlling the game well with half back partner Lewis Andrews.
Week off next week although hoping to arrange a Saints game before a tough trip to Pentyrch on the 24th. Lets keep the good start going lads.
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