Luctonians’ improved form continued with a 29-18 win over Hinckley at Mortimer Park. The weather made things difficult for both teams and the opening quarter was almost farcical, but Lucs recovered to record an important victory.
From a poor kick off, Hinckley caught the ball and passed to the fly half who kicked it into touch on the half way line. As the crowd settled down to the first line out, Aaron Jones threw the ball in quickly to a waiting Mike Thompson, but the fullback slipped on the turf allowing Hinckley to hack forward and get the first try through centre Will Keeling.
Hinckley then knocked on from the kick off, giving Lucs the scrum. Home scrum half Ollie Williams took advantage of the wheel to pick up the ball and accelerate through a gap between the visiting defence to score untouched.
Thompson missed the conversion but was in the points three minutes later when man-of-the-match centre Leon Mells burst through to put his teammate in at the corner. Williams grabbed his second score when, after taking an offload, he cut through the defence to score under the posts.
Thompson added the conversion to ease Lucs into a 17-5 lead but Hinckley showed why they are enjoying such a successful season when they hit back with a penalty from Guy Swadling just before half time.
At 17-8 and Lucs turning round to face a strengthening breeze, many thought the next team to score would win it.
Lucs’ cause was not helped when flanker Paul Hulland had to leave the field injured on 50 minutes.
The difficult conditions under foot and both sides desperation not to give an inch led to some niggle. Hinckley loose head Steve Harvey was lucky only to receive a yellow after he punched George Cataniou and drew a flood of blood from his eyebrow.
Lucs took advantage of the extra man two minutes later when, after a couple of penalties deep in Hinckley’s territory, hooker Nick Byron scored from a driven maul.
Hinckley pride themselves on their defence and, apart from the first 12 minutes that pride was justified, with Lucs under serious pressure when trying to get the ball into Leon Mells’ hands. He made ground each time he got it, running over the churned up surface like a mudskipper.
The break eventually came when Aaron Jones cut through and offloaded in the tackle to Hewitt, who ran 30 metres to the line to give Thompson an easy conversion.
These were the last points in a game that deteriorated in the last 18 minutes but the 29-8 victory was well deserved.
On Saturday Lucs make the trip to Kettering as they look to capitalise on their improved league form.