What a Difference a Day Makes!

Who would have believed it? A full report of yesterday's match against Plymstock will follow in a few days. By now, all readers will have known for a while that St Ives won and gained promotion.

But who would have thought that it would turn out to be as easy as it was, the home side delivering their second biggest win of the season. Their biggest win, 69:6 was inflicted upon local rivals Hayle. Yesterday they travelled to Newquay Hornets and were defeated 10:6. This was surely a surprise and now Tavistock just need a point away to Newquay next week to put Hayle into Cornwall One, having achieved a very satisfying result against poor travellers, Falmouth by 29:10.

No one would have expected what was thought to be a much depleted Pirates Amateurs side to beat Withycombe, to knock them out of any remaining hopes of promotion should St Ives fail. As it turned out, it was another unexpected unpset, with The Devon challengers losing by a single point 27:26.

Finally, it will have also leaked by now that St Ives could not be caught by Withycombe anyway. But it was worth keeping everyone on edge to get such a good spectacle from our last game. The following bullet points are taken from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tribute_Cornwall/Devon.

"If teams are level at any stage, tiebreakers are applied in the following order:

1. Number of matches won

2. Difference between points for and against

3. Total number of points for

4. Aggregate number of points scored in matches between tied teams

5. Number of matches won excluding the first match, then the second and so on until the tie is settled"

Last week's table

One week ago, even if The Hakes had lost with no points against Plymstock, it was impossible for Withycombe to win more matches than us. Since this is the first criteria for tiebreaking, if required, St Ives were already promoted baring any other unforeseen circumstances.

Do look out for the full match report.