National League Division 2 North: Stourbridge 15, Hinckley 10

A HIGHLY entertaining game given the sparse scoreline with Stour edging a close fought contest.

Credit to both sides who tried to run the ball at every opportunity in a match where defending dominated.

Hinckley came flying out of the blocks and trapped Stour deep inside their own 22.

The Leicestershire side forced a series of early line-outs as Stour conceded a string of penalties.

This pressure eventually told as Hinckley set up a rolling maul from which No.8 Alex Salt was driven over and full back Conor Bullivant duly converted.

Stour struck back straight from the resulting kick-off as Hinckley were the forced to soak up pressure in their own 22.

In contrast Stour opted for the scrummages and from one set piece the ball was thrown to inside centre James Otutaha who found the gap to force his way over, full back Luke White kicking the extras to make the score 7-7 after 14 minutes.

Both sides proceeded to cancel each other out, but a White penalty on 24 minutes gave Stour a slender 10-7 advantage by half time.

Stour put Hinckley under early pressure in the second half and soon reaped their reward when quick ball was whipped out from a scrummage and thrown wide for left wing Ashley Elves to squeeze his way over in the corner, White being fractionally wide with his touchline conversion.

Both sides slugged it out from that point.

Hinckley were eventually awarded a penalty on 65, but instead of going for the corner, opted to kick at goal with the bonus point in mind and fly half Joe Glover proved successful.

From the resulting kick-off, Stour had second row Derryn Jones, who had been promoted from the Lions, yellow carded for illegal play.

With Stour reduced to 14, the pendulum swung severely in Hinckley's favour despite being five points adrift.

But Hinckley could make little headway against a well drilled Stour defence and it was the Stourton Park side who proved more threatening during this period as second row Chris Depper, Josh Trinham and Otutaha all went close to breaching Hinckley's try line.

Hinckley were reduced to 14 players themselves right at the death when winger Scott Hamilton was sent to the sin bin for a deliberate knock-on.

Stour should have been awarded a penalty try from the incident but referee Kevin White judged the transgression had taken place too far out.

Stour: White; Elvers, Tilsley, Otutaha, Trinham; Scott, Heatley; Harrison, Wilkes, George; Depper, Jones; Mukarati, Munro, Moore. Replacements: Thorp, Lea, Harding, Petty, Sturdy.