Sidmouth Under-13 s were beaten 35-26 when they travelled to Somerset to face Taunton.

Playing minus a number of regular players Sidmouth, and particularly Jack Jenkins, Jack Marchant and Andrew Donovan, stood up manfully to their extra-large opponents in the front row, during the first half.

With a far superior scrummaging position, Sidmouth provided quality possession from the set piece and went close in the early exchanges. However, Taunton soon put their strong runners through their paces and quickly galloped in four tries to put Sidmouth well and truly on the back foot at half-time.

The visitors played into the wind in the second half and the hardy few braving the freezing cold to watch might have been forgiven for expecting a home avalanche of tries. However, Sidmouth have character in abundance and showed it. Josh Golding stood up to be counted and, time and time again he broke free on the wing to terrorise the home defence.

Louis Stamp’s direct and powerful running netted him Sidmouth’s first try and the forwards completely turned the tables producing a conveyor belt of perfect clean ball. Archie Rowe initiated the waves of attacks with perfect timing from scrum half. The Axminster assassin, Joe Elsworth, tore through their defence and bagged a couple more scores and soon enough it was the Taunton coaches looking around in disarray! Dom Bernhardt chipped in with another try and provided a sweet cross field kick for hard charging Finlay Morgan.

The ball looked for all the world like it would pop up compliantly into the wingers hands for an unopposed score, but died in the long grass and got knocked on. A couple of other clear chances then went begging and Sidmouth finished the match at full throttle, but one score behind.

Charlie Corr and Ollie Leyshon came off the bench to bolster the Sidmouth forwards and Cole again showed his flexibility playing both up front and out in the threes, however there was no denying that Joe Elsworth was a worthy recipient of the Man of the Match award.