Saturday, February 7, 2004

LEE Wainwright ran in six tries as Bromsgrove RFC First XV sauntered into the North Midlands Cup third round with this crushing of Shrewsbury.

At full strength, Dean Ball's side exerted their dominance over Midlands Three West (North) Shrewsbury, going over for 13 tries, ten of which came down the wings.

Wainwright's double hat-trick was added to by Richard Trigg, himself bagging a hat-trick. There was also a try each from Nick Copson, Matt Birch, Dave Clarke and Dave Wilkinson. Birch added 18 points with his right boot.

Director of coaching Ball said: "We did what we set out to do. There's nothing in the law book that says it has to be a contest and we made sure it wasn't a contest."

"He (Wainwright) was creating a lot himself so he should be credited a lot on that. I said before the game a minimum of three was what I expected of him and he kept his side of the bargain."

The match also gave Ball the chance to prepare his players for this Saturday's Midlands Two (West) encounter with Aston Old Edwardians at Finstall Park.

Ball added: "Normally we would field fringe players but we need to build for this part of the season."

And that is made even more important with Derby winning at Stoke last Saturday to knock Bromsgrove from the Midlands Two (West) summit by a point, having played the same amount of games.

Nick Copson is the only doubt after the scrum half pulled up with hamstring injury just two minutes in the second half against Shrewsbury.