Bedford Blues v Coventry

The Blues will be hoping to capitalise on their winning start at Castle Park last weekend by adding the scalp of deadly local rivals Coventry at Goldington Road.

Wing Ian Davey, who joined the Blues from Bath in 2008, is hoping to put an injury-plagued campaign last season behind him. He told Rugby Times,

“I want to be top try scorer in the league. That’s my aim. Hopefully I will score against Coventry.”

Davey continued,

“The game at Donny was the complete opposite to last season when we went out there, didn`t turn up and got annihilated. This time Donny didn`t turn up.”

Coventry director of rugby Phil Maynard has named an unchanged starting XV for the short trip to Bedford which means no place for Tongan international fly-half Fangetapu Apikotoa who joined the club this week.

Maynard said of the Bedford challenge in The Coventry Evening Telegraph,

“They have a strong pack, but so do we and ours is confrontational. We need to get into them from the start, we will need to concentrate for the whole 80 minutes, and our bench has again got a huge role to play.

We’ve worked a lot on our set piece this week, and one thing we did learn from Rotherham is that leaving your best game in the changing room for the first 30 minutes is unacceptable in this league.”

Full Story... www.coventrytelegraph.net

Birmingham & Solihull v Bristol

The Bees go into tomorrow’s tough home baptism in the Championship with a long injury list and on paper at least, little prospect of taking anything from the game with the former Premiership outfit.

Head Coach Russell Earnshaw will be without influential players such as Simon Hunt, Reece Spee and Tal Selley whilst former Cornish Pirates prop Dan Seal is out with a shoulder problem.

Earnshaw told the Birmingham Post,

“For the first time in a long time I am quite nervous. We are missing what a lot of people would say are our first-choice players, certainly in our back division. That means we have had to pick a lot of new players so it’s going to be a big game for quite a few of them.”

“Some of them will be out there to earn their stripes. They have been talking about playing rugby and playing in the Championship, now they have go out and do it.”

Full story.. www.birminghampost.net

Bristol have named their side which includes a number of changes from last weekend`s win against London Welsh.

Centre Jack Adams makes his debut after recovering from injury whilst Redford Penny cook and former Nottingham Number 8 Dan Montagu complete the back row. Mark Irish and David Blaney are recalled to the front row.

Team:-
Tom Arscott; Lee Robinson, Jack Adams, Luke Eves, Dan Norton,
Adrian Jarvis, Jason Spice (C); Mark Irish, David Blaney,
Wayne Thompson, Mariano Sambucetti, Roy Winters, James Phillips,
Redford Pennycook, Dan Montagu

Replacements
Ross Johnson, Darren Crompton, Josh Brown, Iain Grieve, Sam Alford, Mark Davies, Luke Arscott.

Bristol Head Coach Paul Hull has told the Evening Post that his team need to “show patience” and “earn the right to play at this level.”

Full story.. www.thisisbristol.co.uk/bristolrugby

Exeter Chiefs v Doncaster Knights

The Chiefs have handed a debut at full-back to former Truro College and Mounts Bay flyer Josh Matavesi for tomorrow`s clash at Sandy Park.

Emyr Lewis started last week against Moseley but Matavesi, 18, told the club website, “I have got butterflies in my stomach already! I cannot wait to get started.

“Emyr Lewis had a great game last week, so I am really glad to be involved. Emyr is a great guy and has backed me up all the way and helped me plan for this game. He has been more than a team mate.”

Exeter team:-

15 Josh Matavesi, 14 Matt Jess, 13 Phil Dollman
12 Matt Cornwell , 11 Mark Foster, 10 Gareth Steenson
9 Haydn Thomas, 1 Brett Sturgess, 2 Neil Clark
3 Hoani Tui, 4 Tom Hayes (capt), 5 James Hanks
6 Tom Johnson, 7 James Scaysbrook, 8 Richie Baxter
16 Simon Alcott, 17 Ruaidhri Murphy, 18 Sean Tomes
19 Chad Slade, 20 Clive Stuart-Smith, 21 Danny Gray
22 Bryan Rennie

Doncaster Knights Head Coach Lyn Howells has blasted his side following their home defeat against Bedford branding the performance as “unacceptable.”

He told The Star,

"We basically beat ourselves against Bedford. We had enough possession to win two games but we made too many handling mistakes.

"We've worked on that aspect of our game in training this week and hopefully we'll get it right tomorrow because it will have to be 100 per cent better than it was against Bedford.

"We've also worked on getting the ball out quicker from set-pieces; scrum-half Matt D'Arcy was having to dig it out at times and that slowed down the service to the backs."

Full story.. www.thestar.co.uk

Cornish Pirates v Moseley

The full preview for this match is on the Preview Page of this website.

Ian Smith’s Moseley team have a list of injuries and player unavailabilities to contend with as they prepare to try and bounce back from last Saturday’s 50-25 mauling against Exeter.

Centre Andy Reay is still suffering from a hamstring problem, former Pirates and Redruth full-back Rob Thirlby picked up a knock against the Chiefs, whilst James Rodwell and Mark Evans will also be missing.

Gloucester’s decision to field a host of dual-registered players in a Guinness A League match on Monday means that only fly-half Tristan Roberts and prop Rupert Harden will make the trip to Cornwall.

Full story.. www.birminghampost.net

And www.birminghammail.net

Nottingham v London Welsh

Nottingham Director of Rugby Glen Delaney has named an unchanged squad for the visit of London Welsh.

Delaney expressed deep disappointment following the reverse against the Cornish Pirates on Sunday and told The Evening Post,

"The players were disappointed after the Pirates game because they had worked hard in pre-season.

"They are looking at the London Welsh game as a quick chance to get back to winning ways. To be honest we worked very hard for everything against the Pirates and we weren't able to capitalise on our chances.”

"After analysing it, we had more possession, more territory and more opportunity but we simply didn't make that pay. I don't think they had to work quite as hard as we did and there were a few errors that contributed to that.

There's plenty to work on after the game on Sunday and obviously we'll be looking to improve."

Full story.. www.thisisnottingham.co.uk

London Welsh travel to Meadow Lane still smarting from a late defeat at Bristol and also on -4 points in the league table following their RFU sanction for going in to administration.

Former Pirates centre Simon Whatling has been named on the bench.

Teams for Sunday… www.nottinghamrugby.co.uk

Rotherham Titans v Plymouth Albion

The Titans will have Matt Farmer available for selection following RFU clearance after his summer move from Italy.

Albion boss Graham Dawe will be forced into changes for the match as wing Liam Gibson (hamstring) and centre Ben Mercer (dead leg) are rated as extremeley doubtful. Fellow centre Matt Hopper has already been ruled out with a recurtrence of an ankle problem.

Dawe told The Herald,

“Matt Hopper's absence is putting pressure on the squad, but we do have options in the centre with the likes of Steve Johns, Mark Lee and Gary Kingdom all able to play there."

Full story.. www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/albion