MATCH REPORT

8 8 QUICK FIRE QUESTIONS WITH LOUGHBOROUGH LIGHTING VS GLOUCESTER-HARTPURY EMILY SCARRATT AND HELEN NELSON MATCH REPORT

LOUGHBOROUGH LIGHTNING V DURHAM SHARKS 9

FULL TIME: LOUGHBOROUGH LIGHTNING 12-46 GLOUCESTERHARTPURY

HOME TEAM (GLOUCESTER-

HARTPURY) TRIES: Underwood 10, Sing 13, Hunt 30, Tuipulotu 39, Underwood 44, Lund 50, Hunt 56, Jones 68 CONVERSIONS: Sing 31, 50, 59

AWAY TEAM (LOUGHBOROUGH

LIGHTNING) TRIES: Field 27, Malcolm 37 CONVERSIONS: Nelson 28

Loughborough Lightning fell to a 46-12 defeat against a tough Gloucester-Hartpury side on Saturday.

A tight first half where tries were exchanged by both sides saw the Lightning go into the break only 10 points down, but four further Gloucester tries with no reply took the home side to a comfortable victory.

Gloucester started strong and were rewarded after 8 minutes when Rugman found herself out wide to score in the corner, and made it two just a few minutes later when Emma Sing broke down the left side and handed off to Lund to finish.

However, Lightning found their way back into the game with a spell of possession, winning a penalty just into Gloucester’s half. A pin-point kick from Helen Nelson into the corner put the victors in prime position to score, and from the resulting line-out, Bryony Field found her way over from the back of a driving maul. A successful conversion by Helen Nelson narrowed the gap to 10-7.

Gloucester responded immediately with a score from Hunt, which Sing converted to reestablish their 10-point lead but Field scored a second for Lightning in a similar manner to the first.

However, a score from Sisilia Tuipulotu took the home side to 22-12 up at the break. Despite continued effort from Lightning, Rugman, Lund and Hunt both found their way over the whitewash again in the second half, while Hannah Jones added another to round out their victory.

LOUGHBOROUGH LIGHTNING: :Mataitoga, Bolger, Williams, Hardy, Westcombe-Evans, Nelson, Weaver, Bartlett, Field, Belisle, Wassell, O’Donnell, Malcolm, Kabeya, Hunter REPLACEMENTS: Meuller, Trevarthen, Harper, Talling, Hibbert-Jones, Weaver, Svoboda, Tasker

GLOUCESTER-HARTPURY: Sing, Underwood, Jones, Heard, Lund, George, Hunt, Buggy, Powell, Delgado, Tuipulotu, Monaghan, Jones, Lewis, Aldcroft REPLACEMENTS: Jones, Muir, Hale, Else, Brock, Lillicrap, Blackburn, Bridger