Aberavon made it through to the quarter-finals of the SWALEC Cup for the 21st time after defeating Waunarlwydd 33-19 at Roseland Road on Saturday afternoon.
The final score does not tell the full story of the game however as the teams were level at 19-19 late in the exciting game.
The home side opened the scoring seven minutes into the game thanks to a fly half Jonny Davies penalty. Despite the Wizards being reduced to 14 men after a sin bin late in the first quarter it was Aberavon who scored next when fly half Matthew Jarvis kicked a penalty. Jarvis and Davies traded further penalties to make the score 6-6 at the interval.
Waun took the lead at the start of the second half with Davies’s third penalty. The lead was short lived though as the Wizards hit back with unconverted tries from centres Liam Gadd and Will Price.
Back came the home side as Davies kicked another penalty before full back Andrew Rees-Spowart scored at the corner flag. Davies’s conversion made the score 19-16 in Waun’s favour after 56 minutes.
Jarvis kicked his third penalty of the afternoon 10 minutes later to tie the scores before he and Davies both missed with kicks at goal. The home side received two yellow cards in the last 10 minutes but Jarvis missed again with two further kicks.
It took until the 79th minute for the deadlock to be broken when Aberavon hooker Marc Breeze released wing Richard Thomas for a try which Jarvis converted. Deep in injury time replacement lock Rhydian Gierat scored the Wizards fourth try. Jarvis added the extras to give the final scoreline a flattering look in Aberavon’s favour.
