Malvern 46 Hereford 12
Hereford made yet another disastrous start to their game at Malvern.
They shipped three tries and were 17 points down within ten minutes. The forwards put in some sterling effort and after twenty minutes, some hope appeared when a clever chip over the Malvern defence allowed Levi Hughes to touch down for Hereford. However, this was a false dawn and the hosts added two further tries. Before the interval the tally was 29 points to 5.
The injury jinx hit again and Neil Clarke, Fran Jennings, Rory Edwards and Nathan Boden all had to leave the field.
The game had to go to uncontested scrums, leaving Hereford to play the final twenty-five minutes with fourteen men. This was further reduced to thirteen when Levi Hughes was yellow carded with 15 minutes to go. Malvern added three second half tries to a single Hereford contribution when the Wyesider’s pack drove to the Malvern line. Gareth Jones touched down for a try, which Cal Brayshaw converted. The Hereford game was riddled with unforced handling errors and poor decision making, they leaked eight tries and Malvern ran out winners by 46 points to 12. The Hereford forwards, particularly in the second half dominated the set pieces, but ball won was too often turned over giving the strong Malvern backs a good supply of ball.
After the game, Head Coach, Scott Sturdy, said “A really disappointing performance. After getting back on track last week, putting in a very competitive performance against Ludlow and getting a great result, we really didn’t turn up away from home today. I have told the players; we need to turn round and look in the mirror not out of the window looking for excuses. After this really poor performance we have a lot of work to do next week. Malvern had loads of energy! They were exciting when they had the ball and a real threat in the first half moving the ball from edge to edge. Fair play to the lad on the wing, number 11, he took his chances really well.
We now need a big week to reset and get back into training. There may well be some changes in the team for next week. After a bad game like this you have to get back on the horse. It’s back to basics this week and be sure we turn up next week against Newbold.”
