Luctonians storm through in North Midlands quarter-final

11:43am Thursday 26th April 2007

Luctonians 102 pts Camp Hill 0 NORTH Midlands Cup holders Luctonians stormed to a semi-final place with an overwhelming victory against lower-graded opponents Any notion that Luctonians would have difficulty maintaining their momentum after the previous week's Midlands 1 performance against Luton was quickly dispelled as they ran in a first-minute try against Camp Hill.

There were seven changes from the side that had started against Luton, including first team debuts for Alex James at full-back and Bahamian flanker Don Woodside.

James turned in a display of silky running that saw him notch two tries and Woodside, with his crunching tackles and all-round support play, justifiably won the accolade of man of the match.

Camp Hill glimpsed the view down the barrel of the gun straight from the kick-off as quick hands saw left-wing Alex Smith touch down for the opening try.

Scrum-half Chris James added the first of his nine conversions and Luctonians were underway. A procession of tries followed and at half-time they were out of sight with a 59-0 advantage.

In an era when visiting sides cry off for various reasons - the usual excuse being lack of front-row forwards - Camp Hill, after a long and disappointing season in Midlands 2 West, turned up on the day and, despite the scoreline, competed for the full 65 minutes.

The game only lasted 65 minutes because referee Marcus Caton used his discretion and terminated the one-sided contest when Luctonians had reached 100 points.

Luctonians ran in 16 tries, with the backs getting 13 of them, thanks in no small measure to the forwards providing a stream of quality possession.

The Luctonians scorers were Alex Smith (3), Waldo de Jager (3), Charlie Meredith (2), Alex James (2), Dominic Caton (2), Peter Smith, Darran Brick, Chris Jaques and Chris James.

Luctonians travel to Solihull - another Midlands 2 West side - on Saturday for the cup semi-final. But banana skins have been known to lurk in the streets of Birmingham in previous cup encounters and they would be ill advised to prepare for anything other than a competitive match.

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