Brixham 6 - 38 Exmouth

Back in early October when Brixham visited the Imperial Ground for a League game they probably thought they were unlucky to be on the wrong side of a 16pts-14 score line. So when the Cup draw pitted the Cockles away to the Fishermen for the sixth time in Cup competitions, nobody had any illusions as to the difficulty of the task. On the day Exmouth were better in all departments than Brixham and once they had settled down they always looked the more likely to win.

Brixham kicked off and within the first fifteen minutes both sides could have posted a score. Exmouth should have scored after seven minutes when a sloppy pass was intercepted with the line begging but the Brixham player did not have the legs to reach the Exmouth line. On fifteen minutes The Fishermen came close but a stolen lineout quickly followed by a turnover scrum by the Cockles stopped them in their tracks. Exmouth quickly punished them when two minutes later a penalty kick was thumped to halfway. Lineout jumper James Finnegan sailed high to provide Gary Hooper with a pin point pass. Hooper fired a long pass to Dale Sleeman whose pace broke the Brixham defence and Paul Morgan was on hand to score. Richard Cadywould converted and with seventeen minutes played the Cockles were 7 pts-nil up.

Over the next ten minutes Brixham had a good spell and with twenty eight minutes played centre Ben Lovell slotted the first of his two penalties. This seemed to kick start the Cockles back into action as during the remaining twelve minutes of the half they added another twelve points. The first score developed from a scrum on the Exmouth ten metre line when Richard Cadywould dummied the home defence, the ball was carried on by Mark Wathes and it was Dale Sleeman who finished off a fine try. Ben Lovell closed the gap to 12pts – 6 with his second penalty but the Cockles were back on song minutes later. Ed Baxter started it off by breaking blind and off loading to Gary Hooper. He changed the direction of the play which put the Brixham defence on the wrong foot and his pass allowed Dale Sleeman to race in and touch down under the posts. Richard Cadywould converted and Referee Adam Friend DRRS blew for half time with the score 19pts-6 in the Cockles favour.

From the Richard Cadywould restart Brixham punted the ball into touch on their own ten metre line. On receiving the ball Gary Hooper broke the Brixham defence and when he passed to Cadywould the fly half fired over a drop goal with just two minutes played. Brixham had a chance to close the sixteen point gap but with the line open to them a final pass sailed into touch. From the lineout the ball was kicked to halfway and when the Cockles stole another Brixham lineout the writing was on the wall. With ten minutes played playmaker Gary Hooper made way for brother Neil to marshal a pack that was having a good afternoon.

Almost immediately Richard Cadywould missed a long shot penalty but with eighteen minutes played a Paul Morgan intercept took play into the Brixham half. Cadywould carried it on and Mark Wathes took the final pass to score. Jack Westlake replaced James Finnegan, who had had a fine game and the pack, with Richard Sharpe making an impact on his first start with the Club, continued to keep the pressure on the home side. With twenty seven minutes played a Brixham player was sin- binned and Richard Cadywould kicked the penalty to take the score to 30pts-6. With five minutes of normal time remaining Jack Downie scored, finishing off a move started by Matt Hopper in which Dale Sleeman showed once again what a great afternoon he had had. Richard Cadywould finished the proceedings by converting a penalty on forty minutes.