Bridgend Athletic 21 Ammanford 20
Ammanfords start to the season did not quite go to plan with a narrow one point defeat.
Travelling to Bridgend Athletic with new recruits Joe Locke, Harry McBride, Jackson Bonnell and Rhodri Davies. Also back after his world travels was Marco Dallavalle. Ammanford started positively. Both teams looked evenly matched and this was the case. Athletic were first to get on the score sheet with a penalty kicked into the corner followed up by a successful catch and drive ended in a try that was converted by the home outside half who did not miss a kick all game.
Ammanford came back with their own 25m catch and drive that eventually led to a penalty that was slotted over by full back Steffan Roberts. With the half coming to a close a series of pick and drives saw the visitors creep nearer to the home posts before the ball was whipped out that allowed centre Carwyn Morris to hit an excellent angle that sliced the defence wide open scoring under the posts, Roberts added the extra points and Ammanford went into the half 7-10 up.
The second half followed the pattern of the first half with two evenly matched sides working hard to find an opening. Ammanford carried hard through McBride, Marco Dallavalle and Chris Morris, but losing the ball in contact held up any flow. Ceri Morris came on the field 10 min into the half to join his two brothers on the field.
A good ten minute patch for the home team saw them score two tries, both from Ammanford errors. The first came from a lost line out on the half way, Athletic moved it wide quickly and got around the ends of the Ammanford defence, 14-10. Within a few minutes the problem with ball retention struck again as the ball was spilt on the half way. Bridgend Athletic countered to within a few meters of line before being bundled into touch. However, the line out again went astray and the ball was snaffled at the back of the line out allowing a simple try to be scored, 21-10.
A yellow card for the home outside half allowed Ammanford to get up a head of steam. A break and some sharp inter passing between the Morris brothers, Carwyn and Ceri, saw the final pass reach Ceri to power over, 21 -15. Staying positive and with their tails up the visitors pushed for victory. Some strong drives up the middle narrowed up the home defence before the ball was moved wide allowing wing Mike Rees to go over, the home defence kept him as wide as possible to make the kick as difficult as possible for Roberts. This proved to be vital as the kick was missed and the game finished 21-20.
Though disappointed with the result there were some good passages of play and the team are looking forward to next Saturday with a home derby game against Brynamman.
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