Rugby Union: Nant Conwy's treble dream is over

Feb 25 2010

BRYNMAWR 27 NANT CONWY 15

Swalec Plate

NANT Conwy still have every chance of retaining their league and cup double, but were forced to concede any chance of a treble after tumbling out of the Swalec Plate on Saturday.

Defending Division One North champions Nant are still on top of the league pile, despite their advantage being pegged back to just points difference by Caernarfon, who have played a game more.

And they will be back on the cup hunt this Saturday at home against Llangefni in the second leg of the second round of the North Wales Cup (2pm kick off), knowing a victory will see them one step closer to keeping alive their hopes of a second double.

However, the Trefriw outfit saw their hopes of a third piece of silverware and a dream date at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium halted on Saturday as they went down 27-15 at Brynmawr in their first defeat of the season in any competition.

After much consideration whether the match would be played at all due to the bad weather Crickhowell Rugby Club were kind enough to loan the use of its pitch for the game.

A penalty kick after three minutes by Llywarch ap Myrddin opened the scoring, before the visitors went further ahead as right winger Rhys Roberts crossed for an unconverted try in the corner.

And it got even better for Nant as on 22 minutes the visitors were awarded a scrum five and as the pack pushed its way over the line, hooker Gareth Jones was able to get downward pressure on the ball for their second try, this time converted by ap Myrddin to give them a 15-0 lead.

But that was about as good as it got for Nant as on the stroke of half time they were reduced to 14-men for a technical infringement at a ruck and Brynmawr hit back with a penalty and followed up with two tries, one of which converted during the 10 minutes they had the numerical advantage to level the encounter at 15-15.

The play for the rest of the game was fairly even but Nant were outdone by two training pitch prepared moves that they had not come across before.

The moves led to two further tries with one converted for Division Two East outfit Brynmawr.

But Nant will learn from this experience and preapre for such moves in future and use those themselves.

Nant’s team were praised and congratulated by the officials of the South East side and they were of the opinion that the North Wales champions could more than "hold their own" in their league.