London Welsh 22 Pertemps Bees 26

Generous Pertemps Bees made hard work of their trip to the capital.

Whether it was because they felt sorry for struggling Welsh, who have not won a game at Old Deer Park, dubbed Oh Dear Park by locals, all season, Bees seemed to hand their hosts a sack full of gifts.

Just as Steve Williams' men looked to have finally taken the game by the scruff of the neck, they invited the home side back into the match with sloppy errors, missed kicks and sin-binnings.

But comically, Welsh failed to take the bait and, had it not been for a dubious penalty try deep into injury time, they would have taken nothing from this encounter.

Most embarrassingly for the hosts, they failed to make the most of a two man numerical advantage midway through the second half. However Williams knows this game won't live long in the memory and was grateful to bring back a result.

"We got the five points and four tries. The scoreline probably flattered them in the end," said Bees' head coach. "At the end of they day we were close to clicking into gear and running in 60 points.

"I suppose we are trying to play high risk rugby at times and sometimes it comes off but if it doesn't, we've got a bit of a fight on our hands. They spoilt the game very well and you'd expect that when you come to a place like this."

Welsh were indebted to the boot of full-back Sam Ulph who slotted home 17 of his side's 22 points, lifting his season's tally to 92 points.

Maybe if Bees had a similarly reliable figure to slot the ball through the posts this win would have been much more convincing. For the second consecutive week, on-loan fly-half Brad Davies had another below-par performance and was briefly relieved of his kicking duties after the interval for Matt Nuthall.

Ex-Henley man Ulph slotted home five first half penalties to hand his side a 15-12 lead at the halfway point.

The visitors' had opened the scoring through a well-worked try after nine minutes. Skipper Mark Cornwell stole a line-out, Bees powered forward, Hotilli Asi emerged with the ball and laid off Reece Spee before the New Zealander galloped towards the left hand corner for an unconverted score.

Bees' and Spee's second try came on 31 minutes. Some tidy passing down the left-flank between Nuthall and Spee saw the latter go over.

The away side started the second half with their third try after nine minutes. Nuthall converted his own try after benefiting from some good running from Akapusi Qera.

Then, with Cornwell and Matt Long dumped in the sin-bin just after the hour mark, Welsh proved why they will be scrapping it out at the foot of National One this season.

To their credit Bees defended superbly on their line but Welsh had numerous men on the overlap and constantly chose the wrong option. The most notable example arrived on 72 minutes when Welsh had five men on one in the left corner but winger Gerald Arasa knocked-on centimetres from the line.

Bees piled further misery on Welsh five minutes into injury time with their bonus point try, Qera pushed over for his sixth score of the campaign.Welsh had time for a late penalty try but victory was never going to arrive for the sorry home side.

LONDON WELSH: Ulph; Strong (Swords 60), Cadwallader, Storey, Arasa; Cholewa, Shaw (Walbyoff 67); Williams, Ritchie (Campbell 75), Hannon, Quigley, Slade, McNamee, Anayi, Beard (Griffith 73).
PERTEMPS BEES: Goodridge; Billig, Knight, T Davies (Martin 61), Nuthall; B Davies, Spee; Sigley, Miles, Asi (Long 50), Gabey (Davidson 57), Cornwell, Qera, Matthews (Tuohy 57), Halavatau.
Referee: Llayr Ap Geraint-Roberts (RFU).