BLAENAVON RFC played Risca at the Recreation Ground in Blaenavon on Saturday, on a bitterly cold afternoon that seemed to see all four seasons at one time or another during the duration of the game.

Blaenavon started well playing up the slope. With a good solid pack performance, and some clever probing kicks by scrum half Ryan Bates, after working their way to the Risca line, Blaenavon had a line out 10 yards out. A pitch perfect throw in by Dan Horseman resultantly saw the makeshift Blaenavon pack drive to the Risca line and Matthew Billings touched down his own perfect catch to score Blaenavon’s opening try

Blaenavon seemed to be on top, spending long periods in the Risca half but some good away defence kept them at bay, and from a rare Risca breakout their fullback was put away for a breakaway try in the corner which wasn’t converted to make the score five points each after 25 minutes.

Blaenavon kept plugging at the Risca line, with big runs from Sam Cook and Lewis John.

But through unforced errors, they kept giving Risca reliving penalties resulting in them getting out of their half and attacking the Blaenavon defence.

One such attack resulted in a kickable penalty to Risca which they slotted over to make it 8-5 after 30 minutes.

But a great turnover by Matthew Powell, and feed to Dan Horseman saw Blaenavon drive at the Risca line, only to be denied.

From the resulting attacking scrummage, Blaenavon entered into a phase of having four scrums awarded to them on five-metre line.

Winning every one, they started to drive Risca over their own line only for the ref to reset without any cause.

The half time score was 8-5 to Risca.

The second half started at a cracking pace with the lighter Blaenavon pack well on top good work from the back row of Wayne Redman, Callum Davis and Chris Jones.

It saw a ready supply of ball to half backs Ryan Bates and Darren Pearce who kept the Blaenavon momentum going. A good run and carry by centre Dan Phillips put scrum half Bates clear for a well worked try after 58 minutes. The conversion by Phillips made it 12-8 to Blaenavon.

Blaenavon was now dominant in the rucks and mauls taking the game to Risca at every opportunity. Good forward ball meant that Blaenavon could release their big hitters and Sam Evans, Lewis John and Sam Cook made ground at every opportunity. Great cleaning out by the back row allowed the Blaenavon backs to move the ball well and good interplay by Rhys lewis and Rhys Long allowed full back Gareth Jones to hit the line, splitting the Risca defence, and score a great try making it 17-8 to Blaenavon.

Not to be out done right winger Matthew Powell capitalised on a Phillips kick ahead to gather and side step his way over for Blaenavon’s fourth try and bonus point.

Blaenavon spent the last ten minutes in the Risca half pinning them down in the corner and not allowing them to break out with wave after wave of attacks and resulting scrums. Blaenavon just failed at the last hurdle to score on the final whistle.

Blaenavon well deserved their bonus point win and a final score of 22 points to eight, winning the try count four to one.

Next week Blaenavon are away to league high flyers Rhiwbina in Cardiff with an early kick off of 2pm.

The side will have to be on top of its game to get a result down there having lost 2 -11 at Blaenavon earlier in the season.

On present form though, Blaenavon could cause a major upset.