ILL-DISCIPLINE and errors aplenty proved costly for the Cornish Pirates as they fell flat on their face on Sunday.

Despite being down to 14 men for the majority of the Greene King IPA Championship clash after Bevon Armitage saw two yellow cards for deliberate knock-ons, Doncaster left the Mennaye with four points thanks to a 30-13 victory.

Dougie Flockhart should have put the Knights ahead five minutes in, but the league’s top scorer missed what looked a simple penalty from 22m out and just to the left of the uprights.

Kieran Hallett then showed him how it is done in the ninth minute when he slotted home a penalty from 15m out after Armitage’s first deliberate knock-on.

Another fairly simple penalty was missed by Flockhart, but Doncaster went ahead in the 19th minute when Paul Jarvis slipped a couple of tackles to get into the 22 before an offload was sent to Tongan scrum-half Thomas Palu to dot down.

The conversion was added, but a few minutes later the advantage seemed to shift fully in the host’s favour when Armitage saw a second yellow for a deliberate knock-on, producing the red from referee Dean Richards.

Hallett kicked the penalty through and many thought it would be the Pirates who would rampage to the win.

However, the advantage was never taken by them as Doncaster galvanised defensively while the Pirates appeared to deteriorate.

Before the half was up another penalty was kicked by Flockhart, who was now finding his feet from the tee, giving the visitors a 10-6 lead at the break.

A positive start to the second half was needed by the Pirates and it duly came as Max Bodilly’s brilliant 30m run set up a chance which Hallett finished under the posts.

If people thought this would be the moment when the Pirates swept their opponents away, they were very wrong.

A penalty from early 50m out was booted by Flockhart and then he added three more points after Joel Conlon was sin-binned, handing Doncaster the lead again.

Just before the hour mark, the tables were turned in terms of numbers on the field when Alex Dancer saw yellow, meaning the Pirates were down to 13 men.

Before Conlon was allowed back on to make it 14-a-side, a driving maul from Doncaster barged over for a try with Ben Hunter getting the final touch.

From the restart, Hallett did not make the required ten metres with his kick and then from the resulting scrum, a word said by a home player occurred the wrath of Richards who gave a penalty to the visitors.

This set up another converted try scoring moment for the Knights with Flockhart going over, even though it seemed winger Tyson Lewis had knocked-on in the build-up.

With 19 minutes remaining, a heroic fight back was needed by the hosts, but this never happened.

Whenever the Pirates did venture into the Knights’ 22, their chances were killed off either by knock-ons or other penalties being conceded.

With their set pieces not clicking either, it was a bad day to be a Pirates player or fan and when the final whistle sounded, the atmosphere was much bleaker than after the 45-38 win over Bristol a fortnight earlier.

PIRATES: 15 Bodilly, 14 Evans, 13 Hendrickson, 12 Dancer (James 71), 11 Holland, 10 Hallett (Hopkin 71), 9 Kessell (Pope 69); 1 Davies (Walker 61), 2 Channon (Innard 61), 3 Paver, 4 Graulich, 5 Barry (Carrick Smith 69), 6 Morgan (c), 7 Atkinson (Conlon 45), 8 Cheesman.

TRY: Hallett (41).

CON: Hallett.

PENS: Hallett (9, 25).

SIN-BIN: Conlon (45-55), Dancer (56-66)

DONCASTER: 15 Jarvis, 14 Flockhart, 13 Clarke, 12 Armitage, 11 Lewis, 10 Fosita, 9 Palu; 1 List (Davies 49), 2 Hunter (Veikoso 69), 3 Quigley (John 69), 4 Hotson (Makaafi 69), 5 Phelan, 6 Challinor, 7 Hills (c), 8 Shaw (Stedman 72).

UNUSED REPS: Francis, Field.

TRIES: Palu (19), Hunter (57), Flockhart (61).

CONS: Flockhart 3/3.

PENS: Flockhart (36, 45, 48).

SIN-BIN: Armitage (9-19).

RED CARD: Armitage (25).

MAN-OF-THE-MATCH: Alex Shaw.