Rugby Lions maintained their position at the top of the league with a hard fought victory over a solid Luctonians outfit. With all the other promotion contenders also winning it remains very tight at the top. Paul Thompson passed a late fitness test to partner Karl Braband at lock. Steve Stewart made a welcome return, starting on the bench alongside fit again Denzil Evans.

Luctonians had their share of the possession in the early exchanges and Lion’s normally solid first up defence looked decidedly shaky. Following a penalty to the left of the Lion’s posts the away side moved the ball wide to outside centre Ricki Helagi, who ghosted through the home defence with ease for a converted try in the ninth minute.

Lions replied almost straight away with a penalty from Glenn Bond. On sixteen minutes Glenn converted another excellent penalty to make the score 6-7.

Concerted pressure from Luctonians ended when they lost the ball forward under the shadow of the Lion’s posts and they were punished in the harshest way. Tommy Turner picked the ball up and fed Tim Douglas. Some great interplay down the left hand touch line between Tim and James Hawken led to Hawks scoring under the posts. Glenn Bond converted to make the score 13-7 on 25 minutes. Straight from the restart, Luctonians were penalised for not releasing. Matt Goode found touch just inside the away side’s 22 meter line. Karl Braband took the throw and a great forward drive ended with Phill Greenbury claiming the try, again converted by Glenn Bond.

Suddenly Lions were 20-7 ahead and the game was looking fairly safe although with Rugby’s record of giving games away in injury time the home supporters take nothing for granted.

Following a minor fracas off the ball, Phill Greenbury was shown the yellow card for apparently throwing a punch. Luctonians responded strongly and spurned several kickable penalties to go for a try although never really threatening Rugby’s try line.

The second half began with a penalty from Glenn Bond for an obstruction following a grubber kick from Tommy Turner. The play then became quite scrappy with both sides making numerous errors although the play was very competitive. Steve Stewart came on to replace Wilf Barclay. Luctonian’s pack were giving as good as they got although the backs lacked any penetration with many passes going to ground. The visitor’s full-back was rather harshly sin-binned for not releasing the ball despite the fact that they were attacking on the home 22. With the match petering out Lions produced the best try of the game when Denzil Evans (who had replaced Tommy Turner at fly-half) threw a long pass to Matt Goode, who drew his man and slipped the ball inside to Glenn Bond. The full-back dummied to an imaginary team mate and just managed to reach the try line in the Dragon’s corner. The try scorer failed with the conversion attempt.

It is some considerable time since the Rugby Lions have turned the season at the top of their league table but even so they cannot afford to be complacent. In the two previous seasons it was at the start of the New Year when their confidence began to diminish and their performances suffered accordingly. In next Saturday’s game the Lions have to demonstrate their ability to continue in the same vein, and put down a marker for the remainder of the season.

Next Saturday’s visitors, newcomers to Webb Ellis Road, are Luctonians who were last in the town two seasons ago when playing Old Laurentians in a Midlands 1 fixture. This season, postponements have curtailed their away programme with only 50% of the games played in the first half of the season. Of those three games ‘Lucs’ have won two, at Dunstablians and Walsall, but losing at Market Bosworth. At home they have won three and lost three with wins against Bromsgrove, Burton and Kettering and games lost against Bedford Athletic, Luton and Rugby. They are currently in seventh place with 10 points and a points difference of +26.