Defeat at St Helens

A tough baptism for the largely new look Llanelli side. 11 new faces were in the matchday squad and Nathan Hart making his 100th appearance. Although everyone worked very hard it was the All Whites who took the spoils with a bonus point victory. The first quarter was very evenly contested although the home side’s outside half James Davies slotted two penalties to open up the early advantage. On 22mins Llanelli scored their only points with a well worked try. A period of pressure saw the visitors run good ball, a miss pass in mid field saw the ball with new wing Rhydian Williams who showed good pace to finish well in the corner. Swansea got their first try on the half hour from their skipper Jon Fox, he was on the end of a driving maul, Davies again slotted the extras to make the score 13-5. A mistake by Llanelli just before the half ended resulted in the home side extending their lead when full back Max Nagy finished off in the corner. Half time Swansea 18 -5 Llanelli.

llanelli had to make a number of changes throughout the game with a number of more experienced boys picking up knocks, it didn’t help their cause, but the replacements really worked hard to stem the attacks from the home side. In the end pressure told and in the third quarter a further penalty from James Davies and a try from wing Brandon Wood took the game away from Llanelli. I’m not sure what the penalty count was but the visitors really got on the wrong side of the ref and were penalised frequently throughout the second half. Someone had to go and it was Prop Craig Thomas who saw Yellow on 61 mins. Having gone to uncontested scrums and down to fourteen menon the All Whites got their bonus point try on 66mins when centre Jack Evans stole in near the posts. Replacement Steff Williams added the extras to complete the scoring.

Final Score Swansea 33-5 Llanelli