Banbury travelled to Newbold-on-Avon for their latest Midlands 2 West (South) fixture looking to find their form from earlier in the year and to retain the Ernie Fereday Memorial Trophy.

With this being the tenth league game in consecutive weeks, the Banbury squad was looking somewhat depleted through injuries and several second team players were promoted into the starting line up. With some players also out of position, the disruption to both the mid-week training and the starting line up was clear to see from the outset, as a powerful and determined Newbold sider were quick to set down a marker.

Repeatedly gaining quick ball through their fast rucking game, the Newbold backs were given the time and space to be a constant threat and it was not long before a powerful midfield run from ttheir outside centre burst through the defensive line. A simple pass to the supporting man, Reed, opened the scoring. 7-0.

A similar break was to follow as Newbold quickly established a hold on the game as winger Blood went over to stretch their lead to 12-0 after just 10 minutes. Banbury were struggling to gain a foothole in the game and poor kicking did little to help their task as they surrendered possession too easily. However they were to get themselves back in the game, albeit briefly, when captain Eddie Phillips put a clever box kick over the Newbold defence. With the ball bouncing into the in-goal area, outside-centre Matt Smith won the foot race and dotted down out on the right. Phillips was unfortunate with the conversion attempt, which hit the post but Banbury had pulled the scoreline back to 12-5.

However, this seemed to merely act as a catalyst for the home side who upped their game and found the Bulls wanting. Too many missed tackles, combined with poor discipline and a strong Newbold pack meant that Banbury had coughed up the bonus point as two further tries were scored to give a half-time score of 24-5.

The Bulls had desperately under performed in the first half and needed to buck their ideas up if they were to get anything out of the game, but after just two minutes the referee adjudged the Bulls to be guilty of another infringement, which allowed a tap-and-go penalty to be ran back at the disorganised defence. A smarty offload saw Newbold score their fifth try and realistically put the game to bed at 31-5.

But Newbold were on a roll now and despite several good individual performances, notably from Bulls man-of-the-match flanker Chris Phillips, too often Banbury were coming off second best in every facet. Newbold would continue to put Banbury under pressure that they simply struggled to deal with and scored regularly to give a final score of 50-5.

Banbury now need to regroup over the forthcoming rest week and massively improve their performance for their last three league games, or else they may well find themselves in the relegation zone.