They lost both encounters last Season by the narrowest of margins and in injury time, but on this occasion, they just could not get ahead in the game, playing catch up all afternoon.

The visitors were unlucky to lose the services of their experienced centre Marc Saunders with the game only seven minutes old, and they were forced to reshuffle the back division with Carwyn Gregson coming in from the wing and Dafydd Jones coming on as a replacement on the wing.

The first score of the game went to the home side. A speculative clearance kick from their own half was not cleared cleanly by the Lampeter defence and winger Rob Neill managed to get the touchdown despite the efforts of flanker Llion Russell to thwart the nippy winger.

Lampeter went further behind courtesy of a penalty from John Whitticombe and as the game entered the half hour mark, matters were about to get worse for the visitors. An attempted clearance kick by substitute Dafydd Jones was charged down leaving Haverfordwests centre Danny Harries a simple run in for their second try.

Despite being down by thirteen points, Lampeter fought back bravely and were slowly dominating up front with young Prop Meirion Jones outstanding in the scrummaging department.

Their efforts were rewarded, when following a five yard scrum on the home line, flanker Llion Russell crossed for the all important score which was converted by Huw Thomas who had earlier missed two relatively simple penalty kicks from close range.

However, Huw managed to put these misses behind him when he coolly slotted over a penalty from a more difficult angle on the stroke of half time to reduce the score to 13-10 at the interval in favour of the home side.

The second half started brightly for the visitors with all the opportunities coming their way, but a mixture of poor handling and one or two questionable decisions by referee Alwyn Harries going against them meant the score remained the same.

Just as it seemed Lampeter were dominating proceedings, it was the home side that got the all important next score. Once again, it was a breakaway, and a neat pass on the blind side found scrum half Mike Venables who raced clear to score their third try and extend the advantage to eight points.

This was soon extended when once again, a decision went against Lampeter. Flanker Llion Russell seemed to have turned over the ball legally in his own half only for the referee to adjudge it was illegal and from the ensuing penalty, the home side elected to take the penalty and the three points.

As the game approached the final ten minutes, it was the visitors who were once again pressing and they were awarded several penalties on the Haverfordwest five yard line.Three scrums were taken, but despite their domination up front, they failed to score.

They were not helped by the continuous infringements by the home pack which went unpunished by referee Harries.

Had they scored at this time, then the final outcome could well have been different. As it was, the home side managed to break clear and score a late try which was converted.

In the dying minutes of the game, Lampeter did gain some form a consolation for their hard work when scrum-half Joe Thomas scored from close range and with Thomas converting the try, it did give the scoreline some form of respectability of 28-20.

Having had an excellent start to the season, this young squad under the leadership of prop John Rhys Jones will certainly learn from this experience.There were some encouraging performances from flanker Llion Russell and No. 8 Aled Thomas, and with second row Gary Davies again shining in the loose, they have plenty of positives to take forward to their next game, at home next Saturday against high flyers Trimsaran.