Powell sees Scouts through to 3rd Round

Scouts earned their passage through to the third round of the Intermediate Cup with a reasonably comfortable win against a combative Earlsdon team.
Plenty of territory for the home side early on resulted in Adam Frost opening the scoring with a penalty after five minutes.
Frost opted to kick a further penalty ten minutes later into the corner and from the resulting lineout Scouts forwards drove towards the line. After three drives had got them closer second row Richard Bussey was driven over for the score. Frost narrowly missed the conversion attempt.
Scouts were in total command at this point and increased their score when Iain Simmons broke blind from a scrum and fed scrum half Matt Brown for Scouts second try of the afternoon.
Again the conversion was unsuccessful but, as the visitors continued to vent their frustration at the referee, two successful penalties were kicked by Frost before the break.
In between the two penalties Scouts should have scored a further try when winger Ben Crossland broke free from his own half. Arguably he could have scored himself but his pass inside to skipper Russ Lynch went astray.
Earlsdon began the second half with more purpose and reduced the arrears with a well worked try that involved several passes to create a gap in Scouts defence.
Man of the match, full back Tom Powell then scored the try of the match when he started a move from close to his own line. Scouts earned a lineout on half way which was taken quickly and Powell was on hand to gather the ball and outstrip the away defenders.
Scouts were beginning to coast at this point and were given a sharp reminder that they still had a game to win when on the hour an Earlsdon tap penalty saw the score reduced to 24 – 15.
This was a kick in the backside and the sixteen point lead was restored virtually straight from the kick off. Scouts applied enough pressure on the kick receivers to earn a scrum, at which they sent the visitors pack backwards for Jordan Dolman to touch down. Frost added the extras.
Scouts introduced another product of their mini/junior section when eighteen year old Joe Martin came on for his senior debut.
The last fifteen minutes petered out although Earlsdon were attempting all sorts of fancy moves that were never going to work but they did get a consolation try at the death which flattered the scoreline.