WE TAKE 16 POINTS TO WALES

NEWS Saturday 20th May 2006, 10:00am

by Mike Hunter

  Edinburgh Monarchs

The Scotwaste Monarchs have built up a lead of 16 points from the KO Cup first leg.

This is a reasonable level though it doesn't kill the tie off. Newport fought hard, used their TRs well and made some sensible reserve switches, preventing Monarchs from piling up as many points as they would have liked.

There were plenty of good performances on the home side - Rusty won the Monarch of the Match award but Henrik, Theo and William would have been strong candidates too.

Derek had an up and down night but played a very important part in a thrilling heat 14, and Matthew scored solidly.

Monarchs had 11 race winners but of the four that went to the Wasps, two were six pointers. The other two were Andre Compton's heats 1 and 15 wins.

Schramm and Parsons worked hard to give backing to Compton and Wilkinson, and hard work will be what is required of Monarchs on Sunday - as long as the match beats the bad weather forecast.