INJURY-struck Hereford lost their opening Midlands 1 West game against Silhillians despite opening up a commanding lead.

The Wyesiders, who were without at least 10 first team players, including Tom Ewins, Perry Pudge, Mark Philo and Gareth Jones, were at one stage 22-7 up.

But the away side stormed back to win by four points.

Hereford controlled the game from the off and after 17 minutes a good lineout and a driving maul led to Ben Osborne crashing over for a try, which was converted by Matt Milson.

But Silhillians levelled after Alex Winter outran the Hereford defence to touch down in the corner, with Ollie Beech kicking over the conversion.

Ben Hilstead was then introduced to the Hereford front row and his experience returned parity to the home scrum.

A Sils clearance kick, after a chip ahead by Milson, was charged down by Craig Rowlett and some driving play by the forwards ended when Andrew Potter drove over the line to regain the lead. Milson again kicked over the extra points. before Connor Sullivan slotted over a penalty to give the Wyesiders a comfortable 17-7 half-time lead.

The visitors started the second period by pinning Hereford inside their 22, which led to Silhillians forcing numerous penalties.

The referee eventually lost patience and yellow carded Jamie Humphreys.

Hereford managed to maintain their shape though and survived the 10 minutes with 14 men before they increased their lead to 15 points with just 20 minutes left.

From a scrum half inside the Sils half, stand in captain Nat Thomas, paying in the centre, executed a set play to score a neat try.

Milson, who earlier missed a penalty, saw his conversion rebound off an upright.

Hereford seemed to relax though, resulting in Silhillians getting back into the game.

Lee Jones dived over for a try, which Beech converted, before Jamie Roskell went over.

With time running out, Hereford were unable to collect a bobbling ball and Jack Hobbs made the touch down to give Silhillians a 22-22 win.

A disappointed Bob Stewart, the head coach of Hereford was cursing the loss.

"This was a game we should have won," he said.

"Having built up a good lead we took our foot off the gas and were not able to pick up the pace again.

"We gave away far too many penalties and have a lot of work to do."