ABERGAVENNY produced a rampant performance to crush New Tredegar in their final home fixture of the season last Saturday. In the penultimate league game of Aber's National League Division Three East campaign, the claret and ambers gave the watching Bailey Park faithful something to remember with a sparkling display of running rugby. Aber may have narrowly missed out on promotion to Division Two, but there were certainly no signs of disappointment as the home side put hapless New Tredegar to the sword. Scrum-half James Harris got Aber off to the perfect start with a try after just two minutes, and Ryan Williams soon stretched the lead when he crossed, converted by outside-half James Didcote. Aber's dominance was further underlined when Steve Hamer and Kenny Waters both touched down in the opening quarter, and a second by Harris and one from James Williams gave Aber a commanding 34-12 lead at the interval. Didcote increased Aber's advantage with a score on 64 minutes and flanker Stuart Sherrard went over five minutes later. With the clock ticking down, Hamer and Ryan Williams rubbed further salt into New Tredegar wounds by each scoring a further try apiece to bring down the curtain on a magnificent home campaign for the Bailey Park men. Aber coach Gary Lawrence said: "It was a good result and we could have scored more points. I was also disappointing to concede a couple of tries. But it was a nice way to end our home season." Aber may have blown their promotion chances as a result of an indifferent season away from Bailey Park, but Lawrence has a great deal of faith in the current squad and is hoping to wrap up the season in style. There is still an opportunity to claim some comfort from a disappointing end to the league, by collecting the Ben Francis Cup. Aber face a semi final clash against Rhymney at Risca RFC and then a possible final date before concluding their league campaign with an away trip to Pontypool United. Lawrence added: "We are hoping to put out a strong side for the remaining games. Our problem this season has been the availability of players for away games. "But we will go out against Pontypool United and try to score plenty of points, not just go for the win. We have to play our rugby. "It looks like we are going to finish fourth in the league with Old Illtydians set to take the third spot. "But we aim to finish the season with a bang. It is important that we learn our lessons from this season to produce a challenge next year."
