Tribute Western Counties West

Torquay 60,

Ivybridge 13

Ivybridge will be looking to bounce back when they face local rivals Kingsbridge at High House tomorrow afternoon.

They endured a frustrating defeat at the hands of Torquay last time out, shipping 43 unanswered points in the second half as two yellow cards scuppered any chance of a win.

Coach Neil Thomson was seething about the performance of the referee, who he felt should have sin binned a Torquay player early on for a cynical pull-back, and then seemed to punish Ivybridge solely in the second half.

Bridge ended the first half just four points adrift at 17-13, two penalties from Adam Bradley and a well-worked backs try, finished off by Tom Scoles, completing their scoring.

The floodgates opened in the second half, with injuries to Tom Scoles and Sam Kingscott compounding the yellow cards handed out to stand-in fly-half Tim Walker and hooker Nathan Webster.

The fact that flanker Scott Puleston had played the night before, and had to be substituted, didn't help matters.

Refereeing complaints or no, seven second-half tries is not what a side wants to concede.

Thomson admitted that, although he was disappointed with the refereeing, the tackles his side missed were not good enough and is something they've been working on in training.

Looking ahead to the derby day, Thomson expected a similar game to the Tics fixture, with the weather likely to hamper running rugby.

He was keen to emphasise the fact that 30 enthusiastic players turned up to training folllowing the defeat, and insisted the club was viewing the game as a one-off, and a learning curve for the young side.

He said: 'We proved we could match them in the first half, and the missed tackles is something that has not happened in the previous games we've been winning.

'We've worked on that, and our game plan for the Kingsbridge match.'