Cornish Pirates

Newbury v Cornish Pirates
Saturday September 29th Kick Off 3:00pm

Having just secured a first bonus point win of the season at home to Pertemps Bees , the Cornish Pirates will now be keen to not only earn their first away five pointer of the campaign at Newbury this Saturday, but to also make it five wins out of five from games played between the two teams at National One level.

Of the four recorded victories to date, the Pirates have won pretty comfortably at home, but have just squeezed through away - 26-25 in September, 2005, and 20-15 back in January, so they'll take nothing for granted.

The Pirates have made a number of changes from the team that faced the Bees, the good news is that skipper Tim Cowley makes a welcome return from injury, allowing Chris Cracknell to move his more accustomed role on the blind-side flank, with Eniola Gisende dropping to the bench.

Ollie Thomas , a close season signing from Moseley, and who was third in the league's top points scoring list last season, is set to make his debut at full-back in place of the injured Adryan Winnan, and Ali Koko, concussed in the match against the Cornish All Blacks, takes the wing spot occupied last week by Paul Devlin who will now partner Steve Winn in the centre.

Nick Buckley, who has had a starting role in the past couple of games, is on the bench. Richard Bolt will wear the number nine shirt once more, and Dan Seal is gifted a starting role at tight-head prop ahead of Sam Heard.

Having finished 11th in the league last season, the 'Blues' are presently 13th after recording a narrow 14-13 points win away to Sedgley Park last weekend.

Former Pirates winger Jonny Hylton , who had a fine match when we beat Exeter at Twickenham in April, will be keen to do well in new colours, whilst flanker Chris Morgan, who had a spell with us on loan from Bristol a couple of seasons back, is a very able performer.

Other quality players to have impressed against the Pirates in the past include No. 8 Tom Brown, former England wing David Rees, plus the likely half-back pairing of Dan Smaje and Tim Walsh.

Cornish Pirates
15 Ollie Thomas, 14 Ali Koko, 13 Paul Devlin, 12 Steve Winn, 11 Rhodri McAtee
10 Gareth Steenson, 9 Richard Bolt, 8 Tim Cowley (capt), 7 Iva Motusaga
6 Chris Cracknell, 5 Bruce Cumming, 4 Joe Beardshaw; 3 Dan Seal
2 Nathan Kemp, 1 Peter Cook.

Replacements
16 Rob Elloway, 17 Sam Heard, 18 Scott Hobson, 19 Eniola Gisende
20 Nick Buckley, 21 James Moore, 22 Brian Tuohy.

Last Time 13/01/07 Newbury 15-20 Cornish Pirates