KING’S School retained the Modus Challenge Cup with an “outstanding” defensive display to beat Royal Grammar School Worcester 15-5 at Sixways.

An early try from fly-half Alfie Pritchard sent King’s on their way before wing Sam Lowe and centre Dion King both went over at the start of the second half.

However, the winning director of rugby Jonny Mason was keen to stress how well his side did to hold firm against RGS, whose only try came from replacement George Cook late on.

King’s twice went down to 14 men with Matt Tolley and Will Revill sin-binned but RGS failed to make numerical advantage count.

“Although we didn’t play as well as we could have done with ball in hand, defensively we were outstanding throughout,” Mason said.

“We really cut down their options and made it hard for them to get front-foot ball.”

Mason said he was not surprised to only hold a 5-0 advantage at the interval following a half dominated by RGS.

“When we won 32-3 last year, it was only 11-3 at half-time so we talked to the boys about keeping their patience and discipline,” he continued.

“We really stepped up in the first 10 or 15 minutes of the second half to put the game to bed with those two quick-fire tries.”

It was the third successive time King’s have come out on top in the annual event, which was watched by more than 3,300 spectators.

“When we got on the front foot, we scored three excellent tries,” said Mason, who also hailed Pritchard’s performance as “outstanding”.

“We were frustrated with big patches of the game but for the boys it is all about the win and you could see the outpouring of emotion at the end of the game.”

RGS, meanwhile, are still searching for their first win since 2013 after a frustrating night on Worcester Warriors’ new synthetic pitch.

Despite all their possession in the first half, they could not get off the mark as they were held up over the line and had a try ruled out for a forward pass.

Sam Hughes also missed two penalties.

RGS director of rugby Ben Taylor admitted the final result was a “fair reflection of the game”.

“If you look at the stats at the end of the match, we would have been in their half a lot more than they had been in ours,” he said.

“But their execution was better than ours, which was a bit disappointing.

“You can’t be in their half as long as we were and not come away with any points.

“They came into our half three or four times and got three tries and did the job.”

However, with the help of former Warriors scrum-half and ex-England international Shaun Perry, Taylor is hopeful of coming back stronger next year.

“You usually get really strong and really weak year groups and we have got an unbeaten team over two years coming up next year,” Taylor added.

“It has been fantastic to have Shaun coaching us this season and he wants to stay on and develop these boys over the next few years.”