BUCS Rugby Review - Week 4

Week four of the BUCS Rugby Competition saw a whole host of exciting games of student rugby around the country, on a cold, wet and windy Wednesday afternoon.

The big game of the round was an evening kick-off, however, as Leeds Met travelled to Durham.

The game was an incredibly close fought affair under the North Eastern floodlights. Durham got off to the stronger start scoring two tries through McCollum and Captain Simon Hammersley.

However, the Met were not going to roll over without a fight, as they eventually got themselves into the lead at 14-12.

However, the reigning BUCS Champions turned the game around with a brilliant second half performance to emerge eventual victors, 29-14.

Durham stay top of the Premier A League, joint on three wins from three with Newcastle University. Whereas, Leeds Met fell to fifth in the league with just the one win so far this season over Loughborough last Wednesday.

Newcastle continued their unbeaten run with a 20-10 victory over the University of Nottingham at Cochrane Park in the North East.

Nottingham stay rooted to the bottom of the league, still without a win.

The other game in the Premier A league was between Loughborough and Northumbria University at Lougborough’s Epinal Way ground.

The home side put on their performance of the season, and perhaps the performance of the week, as they crushed Northumbria by 62 points to none.

The win sent Loughborough to third in the league, seven points behind the leaders, and Northumbria down to fourth, with one win from four attempts.

In the second tier of the BUCS North Rugby competition the league’s only two undefeated teams, Manchester and Birmingham, collided in the North West.

The Midlands side were visibly bigger upfront, and the difference in size shone through in the first half of the game.

Poor set piece play and defence led to Birmingham opening up a three try lead in the first half that was never recovered.

Birmingham started the second stanza the stronger again, scoring a fourth try. However, Manchester then did begin to kick into gear and show their own prowess as they managed to pull a try back.

The early deficit proved too much to handle, as Birmingham came out eventual winners with a final score of 35-8.

As a result Birmingham moved to clear leaders in the league, as the only undefeated team with three wins from three.

Elsewhere in the league, Durham 2nds beat Nottingham Trent 27-12; Loughborough recorded their second win of the day, beating Sheffield Hallam by 49 points to 21; finally Edinburgh beat the University of York 18-15.

The North B league looks to be heating up this year with three games gone, as Birmingham are in front with three wins from three, but Durham, Nottingham Trent and Manchester are close behind with just one loss from three games.

In the Southern half of the BUCS Rugby Championship, only one game was played in the A Division. Hartpury travelled to Swansea University and recorded a difficult away victory over the border by 46 points to 10.

The victory took Hartpury to the top of the league with three wins from three.

And finally in the Southern Premier B League, league leaders Reading lost for the first time this season, in a close fought affair away at the University of South Wales, Pontypridd and Cardiff. The visitors eventually went down 22-20 to the Welsh.

However, Reading have managed to retain their top spot in the league on 11 points with their opponents one point behind in second.

Elsewhere, Hartpury 2nds beat the University of Exeter second team 19-17.

With three games gone for most University sides the BUCS competition is really beginning to heat up.
Who will win next week?

Tune in to Talking Rugby Union to find out….