Hinckley ended a run of 3 league matches without a win on Saturday with a bonus point victory at Newport, their first win in Shropshire since 2009.

HInckley made a number of changes from last week's disappointing draw with Longton. Liam Warren and Ben Marshall both moved from the bench to start, whilst Alex Branson made his debut at openside. In the backs Tom Hilyer replaced Sam Greasley with Josh Smith moving to fly-half Mark Lord a late drop out, opening up a space for Rob Bryant in the centres. Three forwards were selected on the bench with Ewan Bartlett and Matty Walker coming into the squad.

Playing with the strong wind in the first half, establishing territory wasn't difficult and this pressure created two early penalty opportunities, both of which were converted by Joe Glover for a 6 - 0 lead after 10 minutes.

From the restart after the second penalty, Ben Marshall intelligently gathered the kick after it had been blown back towards the half way line and Newport had stopped expecting the scrum, and following good carrying work from him and Matthew Fearn, Hilyer broke through two tackles to score on the left hand side.

With 20 minutes played Hinckley scored again, with the dominant scrum driving Newport 15 metres from the 22, and once the penalty advantage was given, Morris broke from the base and went in close to unopposed.

In the rest of the half Newport got their hands on the ball and had a couple of opportunities to score although the Hinckley set piece stopped most attempts. However a set piece failure on half time from the visitors created the opportunity for Newport to score on the whistle, leaving Hinckley 16 - 5 up at the break.

With Hinckley now playing against the wind, it was felt Hinckley probably went in a try light with Newport now managing to control field positions however the pressure wasn't able to be converted into points, and the one occasion Hinckley got into the home 22 in the first 20 minutes of the half, Glover scored the third try for a 21 - 5 lead.

From then on in Hinckley's focus was purely on gaining the bonus point with every point crucial in the run in, and it came with the last play, with Morris scoring his second from short range. Glover converted with the final kick of the game.

Although this wasn't Hinckley at the team's fluid best, the control of the game, the penalty count and the composure was much more like the side from earlier in the season and as the game went on the confidence could be seen returning to the squad. There is a lot to continue to do in training, but the signs after today are positive.

Next week Hinckley welcome Nuneaton to Leicester Road.