Cornwall are back at Twickenham following a 43-0 win over Eastern Counties on Saturday at Camborne.
It was all over by half-time as the Black & Golds raced into a 36-0 lead at the break. Just like last week at Hertford Cornwall scored an early try an absolute beauty with “made in Launceston” written all over it, Scrivener, Perry, Westren to Jess to score, what a start. Scrivener’s conversion the first of six successful kicks, only one conversion missed all afternoon before the Launceston fly-half had to leave the field with a nasty eye injury. Unlike last week Cornwall went from strength to strength steadily building on their lead throughout the opening period. Ten minutes were barely up before Cornwall had a second try scored by No8 Sam Hocking as Cornwall took a heal against the head in the Counties 22, the young No8 breaking off and powering over from close range. Scrivener kept the scoreboard ticking over with a second conversion and a penalty after 21 minutes. Paul Thirlby put a stop to the Launceston points scoring by squeezing in the clubhouse corner for Cornwall’s third try following another flowing move. A few moments later Thirlby was on hand to get his second try of the game. Cornwall’s fifth try came from Mount’s Bay’s Ben Hilton. Half-time 36-0 the game was as good as over.
Cornwall completed their scoring early in the second half with a wonderful individual effort from Redruth flyer Lewis Vinnicombe who showed real pace in carving his way through the Counties defence. Cornwall brought on their bench players during the second half and the intensity dipped naturally, Eastern Counties had periods of pressure but couldn’t breech the Cornish line as the Cornish defence held firm. Matt Jess was the victim of a nasty looking tackle, which rightly saw the offending Counties player sent to the sin bin, it was an isolated moment in a game played in good spirit by both sides, in the end Counties had to acknowledge that on the day they had been well-beaten by the better side.
Having mentioned the try scorers it would be wrong not to acknowledge the superb team performance, Richard Carroll immense in the pack, Darren Jacques who in my opinion is most unlucky not to have made the England Counties tour to North America, Josh Lord, Captain Marvel, leading by example from the whistle, Jess and Vinnicombe what a pair to have on the wings, they will both be relishing the prospect of that big pitch at Twickenham and the space it will have for them to show their paces.
Cornwall are back at Twickenham where they will face Northumberland in the Shield Final, the kick-off time for this match has been confirmed by the RFU as 10am on Sunday 1st June, tickets available either from the CRFU, the RFU or ticketmaster.
See Trelawny’s Army main page for travel and accomodation details for Twickenham.
Cornwall: P. Thirlby, M. Jess, R. Westren, S. Perry, L. Vinnicombe, M. Scrivener, M. Richards; D. Jacques, J. Salter, D. Clackworthy, B. Hilton, R. Carroll, J. Lord capt, A. Nicholls, S. Hocking.
Replacements all used; R. Pellow for M. Richards, J. Semmens for S. Perry, D. Semmens for J. Salter, P. Andrew for D. Clackworthy, J. Griffiths for B. Hilton, C. Fuca for A. Nicholls, M. Churcher for M. Scrivener.
Cornwall points Tries- Jess, Hocking, Thirlby (2), Hilton, Vinnicombe, Conversions- Scrivener (5), Penalty- Scrivener.
