Ealing Cougars produced a strong performance against a tough and resilient London Welsh Occies side to record a hard fought and well deserved win.

The Cougars started well and scored a try in the first five minutes with Adam Hulmston crashing over from 5 yards out. The Cougars poured on the pressure but for handling errors and stout defending from the Occies should have had a couple more scores. The Occies defence was strong and swarming and the Cougars were finding it hard to break down, the Cougars scored another try under the posts after some good work in the forwards and setup a good backs move which resulted in John Haigh going over under the posts. The Occies replied with a sweetly taken penalty from the half way line and the score at half-time was 12 - 3.

The Cougars started the second half in determined fashion and scored a well worked try started in our own 22 through youngster John Kane having yet another good game powering over from close in after a great passage of play.

The Occies were having trouble coping with the increased pace that the Cougars were playing at and were consistently fringing in an attempt to slowdown the Cougars ball.

The referee gave the Cougars several penalties and after a series of infringements on the Occies try line the ref gave the Cougars a penalty try.A

Andy Jack completed the scoring with a well taken solo try and finished the game with a personal tally of 16 points, although was guilty of gifting the Occies an unlikely try when throwing a wild Hail Mary pass which was intercepted by a grateful Occies player to score under the posts, final score 36 - 10 to the Cougars.

Special mention must go to the Cougars back row of Brian Kennedy, John Kane who is really playing some of his best ever rugby and Adam Hulmston for a sterling effort and caused the Occies a lot of problems and turned over a lot of ball.

A much improved performance from Last week’s dismal display against Rosslyn Park. The Cougars will have to keep improving as they play away against London New Zealand next week in what will be Ealing Stalwart Jody Dwyer’s penultimate game for the Cougars and Ealing rugby club.