Rotherham Titans put in an excellent performance to run out 71-5 winners over Loughborough Students on a bitterly cold afternoon at the University Ground.
Titans outscored their opponents by 11 tries to 1 and now move into third spot in the table, 4 points behind league leaders Stourbridge.
Titans 11 tries came way of a hat-trick for hooker Harry Newborn, a brace for scrum half Sam Boxhall and one each for Callum Bustin, Harry Dunne, Jamie Cooke, Marcus Payne, Fran Entressengle and Matty Drennan, with fly half Matt Minogue impressing with 16 points from the tee on debut.
To be fair to Loughborough they never stopped battling and tried to play some rugby whenever they managed to get some possession. Unfortunately for them that was not very often as they came up against a Rotherham side that was intent on putting in an 80-minute shift.
As early as the third minute the writing was on the wall as Matt Minogue pierced the Students defence to slip in Sam Boxhall for the easiest of dot downs.
Then in the space of 10 minutes the Titans pack showed their prowess as hooker Harry Newborn and number 8 Callum Bustin powered over for two more tries, the latter showed tremendous desire and strength to get over the line.
Next it was the Titans backline that joined the party as Minogue was again the creator of two more tries. The first saw the Aussie throw a long miss-pass to Harry Dunne who ran in to score and the second 3 minutes later saw him nudge a short miss-pass to winger Jamie Cooke who glided in to score.
There was just time before the break for Rotherham to register their sixth try of a pulsating first half when Callum Bustin again showed great determination to break the line before off-loading to Newborn for his second try of the half.
Indeed he didn’t have to wait too long into the second half to register his hat-trick when on 48 minutes he was on hand to dot down from the tail of a catch and driver close to the line.
Ten minutes later and Roth had their eight try when scrum half Sam Boxhall made himself “popular” with the pack when he broke from the back of a drive to snipe over to score.
Titans ninth and tenth tries came via the catch and drive after more impressive work by the pack, with Marcus Payne dotting down the first and Fran Entressengle nonchalantly touching down for the second. In between those tries Loughborough registered their sole points in the game from a Will Sanders try five minutes before the end.
Rounding things off with the final try of the match in the last play of the game was replacement scrum half Matty Drennan, who took a quick tap from 25 metres out and proceeded to dance his way through the defence to score a fine try.
Speaking on the pitch at full time, a delighted Titans head coach, Adam Byron, said:
“I am really pleased with how things went today; we were happy with our first half last week and we asked the boys for an 80-minutes performance this week and that’s what they delivered.
“To score 11 tries in a game is outstanding; the boys showed great patience and had the ability to trust the structure, stick to it and to be patient with the transitioning into that structure when we were in the right areas to play rugby and that obviously paid dividends today.
“We conceded a lot of penalties last week and we knew we needed to tidy things up in that area, because we knew if we didn’t then a team like Loughborough would throw the ball around and use those opportunities to hurt us. So our discipline at the breakdown was critical.
“We were also physical with our carries and we understand the kind of rugby we can play when our pack creates that kind of platform, particularly so against teams which are a little less experience.
“We are starting to play off the foundation our pack is presenting; they are so hard-working and often get us on the front foot and they are capable of scoring the set-piece tries, as well as creating opportunities for our backline.
“The table is very tight at the top and so not only is winning games important, but picking up those bonus points is going to be critical to the final outcome.
“Every week we have got to be looking to come away with that 5-point win and as I’ve said that will only come if we are putting in 80-minute performances.”
Referee: Peter Connor
Attendance: 218
Yellow Card: Challinor (Titans), O’Neil & Wainwright (Loughborough)
Titans: Newborn (3T), Boxhall (2T), Bustin (T), Dunne (T), Cooke (T), Payne (T), Entressengle (T), Drennan (T), Minogue (8C)
Loughborough: Sanders (T)
Titans: 15 Tom Lewis, 14 Connor Field, 13 Mat Clark, 12 Harry Dunne, 11 Jamie Cooke, 10 Matt Minogue, 9 Sam Boxhall (Drennan 69), 1 Charlie Capps (Donkor 49), 2 Harry Newborn (Entressengle 54), 3 Rikki Stout (Quigley 54), 4 Matt Challinor, 5 Matt Smith, 6 Theo Nwosu-Hope (Newborn 66), 7 Zak Poole (Capt.), 8 Callum Bustin (Payne 59).
Replacements: 16 Fran Entressengle, 17 Colin Quigley, 18 Alastair Donkor, 19 Marcus Payne, 20 Matty Drennan.
Loughborough: 15 Alex Wainwright, 14 Will Sanders, 13 James Langston (Trinder 66), 12 William Trinder (Sixton 39), 11 Darragh Walsh (Scharink 64) (Walsh 69), 10 Luca Caplin, 9 Matteo Petrozzi (Nayor 56), 1 Leroy O’Neil, 2 Isaac Bell, 3 Mink Scharink (Parker 48), 4 Harry Longworth (Adlington 49), 5 Chukwuemeka Atuanya (Shine 49), 6 Nicholas Jennings (Capt.), 7 Daniel Eckersley, 8 Nicholas Jakobsen (Atuanya 69).
Replacements: 16 Thomas Parker, 17 Tobias Adlington, 18 Jack Shine, 19 James Nayor, 20 Troy Sixton.
