Falmouth 8, Kingsbridge 24

The Eagles were not to repeat last week’s success, leaving the Recreation Ground with a 24-8 loss to Kingsbridge, writes Charles Currie.

Falmouth came out with a fiery start, apply pressure to the Devon side, leading to a penalty kick by Matt Horton in the 15th minute. Kingsbridge replied with a try after battling a strong Eagles defence only six minutes later.

For a moment, it appeared Falmouth’s Nick Carne could be on an advancement for the team, breaking through Kingsbridge defence to make it to the try line but walking back devastated after the referee called a knock on.

With hard play throughout the first half, it ended with Kingsbridge scoring their second try, followed by a conversion, leaving Falmouth 12-3 down.

The Eagles came out with more determination in the second half. They dictated a lineout, forming a maul to see Joe Martin score the team’s first try of the match.

In the last ten minutes of the match, Piers Garway-Templeman, made an incredible tackle against a solid Kingsbridge attack on Falmouth’s try line. Kingsbridge managed to navigate through and score.

Falmouth made several attacks to attempt to regain some points, but Kingsbridge were able to make the most of any errors made and scored their final try in the 75th minute.

Eagles Head Coach, Graham Whitmore, said: “We created a lot of territory pressure. We had a lot of possession. We put ourselves into a lot of good positions. And rarely did I feel that they had any sustained pressure on us. They didn’t have a lot of field position. They just reacted off our errors. We made a number of significant individual errors, defensively and also one or two decisions in attack, which they capitalised on.”

Looking back at the game, Captain, Tom Spiller said: “We’ve just compounded our areas again this week. Kingsbridge are a good side… It’s nothing against us personally but we’re just missing those little one on ones and they’re hurting us at the moment.”

The Eagles will be back in action at home next weekend, taking on Saltash in the Cornwall Cup.