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KIDWELLY YOUTH 6 NEWCASTLE EMLYN YOUTH 13

The young Emlyn hopefuls travelled to Kidwelly to face their Carmarthenshire rivals in a match which doubled up as a league and cup contest.

The Kidwelly outfit, fresh from a victory last week against the cup holders Felinfoel, have this season claimed the scalps of both Llandovery and Llangennech.

The Emlyn Youth's last league success stretched way back 22 months ago to April 2013 with a home success against Llandovery.

The Emlyn squad travelled with expectant anticipation and welcomed two members of their Under 16 team Osian Davies and Rhydian Davies into their squad.

It was apparent that the Emlyn team were up to the challenge of facing a buoyant Kidwelly team and the marker was set from the kick off when centre Daniel 'Post' Jones cut his opponenet in half with a crunching tackle,much to the delight of his team mates.

It was evident from the outset that Kidwelly had a route one approach, attacking down the channel mainlly via their inside centre and back row. They did however have a number of tricky runners whotested their opponents at every opportunity. Emlyn were up to the challenge and the early attacks were sniffed out by some fine defensive tackles by Llew Morgan and Ifan Lloyd.

This Emlyn team are not afraid to throw the ball about and they were at their best spreading the ball wide to their exciting running wingers. Gethin Vobe and Owen Thomas have worked hard to develop this style of play which is sometimes risky but exciting to watch.

The home team opened the scoring with a 20 metre penalty following an offside on the left hand side of the field.

Emlyn responded after 20 minutes with a well worked try. The forwards produced a drive led byDylan Kench and drove deep into the Kidwelly 22. Kidwelly however somehow managed to steal possession and attempted to relive the pressure with a high kick towards the left hand touchline.The kick failed to cross the touchline and was gathered by retreating winger Oliver Butterworth on halfway. The winger counter-attacked,beating his opposite number with an angked run infield. Themove continued with Olly swerving inwards past a second opponenet before linking up with hisinside backs. Two passes later and the ball reached the strong running Mark Ramsey who gallopedinto the twenty two, brushing aside two attempted covering tackles to score a fine try.

The away side started to control possession and captain Aled Jones and Hefin Powell ran back at the opposition like a pair of stampeing buffaloes. The second row pairing of Richard Jones and JamesGwynn covered every balde of grass and contested  at the close exchanges.

The home team were penalised for failing to roll away from a tackle and Dan Jones stepped up to slot over a 22 metre penalty to make the half time score : Kidwelly 3 Emlyn 8.

The second half started with the home team thrwoing everything at Emlyn with a wave of attacks which took them deep into the Emlyn22. The red and whites however stood firm and denied the home team the try they sought. Kidwelly had to settle for a second penalty as reward for all their efforts.

Emlyn replaced Kench at prop with scrum half Dafydd James, this in reponse to the opposition failing to field a combative front row. This enabled them to introduce the probing Thomas Joneswho slotted in at 9. With two 9's on the field Emlyn ensured that a stream of passes headed theway of fly-hlaf Crwys Rees who gained territory with a number of angled kicks into the opposition territory.

The tackle area was extremely combative and both teams battled for the straglehold and the scorewhich would enable either team to take control of the game. During this period a number of minorincidents occured where exchanges became overheated. Following one of these incidents Emlynlost the services of Ifan Lloyd and Daniel Jones for 10 minutes to yellow cards. The opposition alsoreceived similar punishment from the referee.

After 20 minutes of the second half Emlyn were awarded a kickable penalty some 28 metres fromthe opposition line. It appeared that they would settle for an attempt at 3 points but prop Tomos Rees had other thoughts. He spotted a gap in the home defence and took a quick penalty. Rees droveinto the opposition 22 before releasing quick ruck ball. The ball was fed from Thomas Jones ontoCrwys Rees and along the back line via Hefin Jones to flanker James Gwynn fed full back MathewRollins on a darting run before diving over in the left hand corner for a fine team score.

During the final period of the half Emlyn defended bravely and counter attacked with some finedefending through CHristian Price and Ifan Davies who nullified the Kidwelly threat.

When the referee blew the final whsitle there was great delight in the Emlyn team and this win takes them into the semi-final of the West Carmarthenshire Cup

Emlyn team ; 15. Mathew Rollins 14. Oliver Butterworth 13. Daniel Jones 12.Llew Morgan 11. Mark Ramsey 10. Crwys Rees 9. Dafydd James 8. Aled Jones(capt) 7. Christian Price 6. Ifan Lloyd 5. Gareth Stevenson4. Richard Jones 3.Tomos Rees2.Hefin Powell 1.Dylan Kench

Subs: 16.Ifan Davies 17.Hefin Jones18.Thomas Jones 19.Rhydian Davies 20.Osian Davies