RUGBY UNION: DEFENCE specialist James Pritchard was without doubt the happiest member of Coventry’s coaching team after they registered their first away win of the season at Hull Ionians.
With 20 minutes gone the visitors led 19-0 with young winter Owain James crossing twice early on and he came close to scoring a hat-trick only to be behind by a last ditch tackle.
Scrum-half Pete White scored a third try for Coventry, with Will Maisey scoring two of three conversions to put Coventry in control.
Two tries either side of half-time got Hull back into the match but sandwiched in-between White was able to finish off a fine move to score his second and Coventry’s fourth to make it 26-14 as the second half progressed.
Maisey missed a penalty attempt before an excellent scrum on 67 minutes led to a fifth Coventry try for replacement Tom Wheatcroft who scored his first try for the club, which Maisey converted.
Tom Howe scored a sixth down the right and an excellent Maisey kick put Coventry out of sight before Ionians had the final say with a late try of their own.
“We’ve gone to one of the hardest places to play at in this league, so to put in a defensive effort like we did and only give up two tries – and, of course, that last one right at the death – means I go away happy,” said Canadian international Pritchard.
“At times it wasn’t pretty, but we backed ourselves, we did the basics and we looked after each other, and it showed. We wore them down and we took our chances when they came.
“We talked about it at half-time and we knew they’d come back at us, they’re a team that sticks in there and they dog it out, and if we’d started to slip off tackles and go too high, they would have pegged back another try, got their tails up and got back into the game.
“But we did well. We knew that if we just kept them at arm’s length, got underneath and chopped them, then we were in with a good shot, and it just showed what we can do if we’re on our game.”
Up next for Coventry is a home clash against Blaydon and Pritchard knows there is still plenty of work still to do.
“We’ve won three on the bounce, that’s our first win away from home and that’s a tick in the box,” Pritchard.
“We didn’t start as well as we’d have liked and we’ve still got some big games ahead, starting with Blaydon at home on Saturday.
“We can’t settle on our laurels, we need to pick things up and push on. There’s great competition in the squad which is a good and a bad thing as a coach when it comes to selection, but that’s brilliant and really what you want to see.”
4th Jun, 2026
