Preston Lodge endured a difficult start to the new year as they were well beaten at home to RHC Cougars at Pennypit on Saturday, severely denting their promotion hopes.

Mark Steedman’s side returned to action for the first time since December 20, and the Preston Lodge head coach preferred Cammy Simpson to Dale Gordon at scrum-half, while Jonathan Brash and Paul McClung were both missing from the back-three.

The visitors began the match the brighter, with several attacks inside the PL half thwarted only by some good scramble defending by the county club.

It was not long before they did open the scoring, though, as Fraser Thomson went over for the visitors.

Euan Morrison’s conversion made it 0-7 with less than 10 minutes on the clock.

And things got worse for the home side inside quarter of an hour when RHC broke clear and a perfectly-timed pass put Ross McCann away to score the visitors’ second try.

Morrison’s kick from out wide was off-target, but Preston Lodge were facing an uphill battle to get into the match, 0-12 down.

Steedman’s charges had a chance to get back into the match when they were awarded a penalty in front of the posts just two minutes later, but the county side turned down the three points as they pushed for the try. Despite going close, the ball was lost and the visitors were able to clear.

Full-back Dean Cunningham showed his prowess under the high ball to launch a number of PL attacks, along with Jonny Sked and Alec Jessop, but they came to nothing, and they were dealt a further blow when the visitors scored their third try.

Morrison was the man to benefit from some poor PL tackling and, although his conversion was wide, the visitors were 0-17 ahead.

Graeme Patterson reduced the arrears with a penalty, leaving the county side 14 points adrift at the interval at 3-17.

The hosts would have known that marked improvements were required in the second half for them to get anything from the match, but they got off to the poor start as Morrison landed a drop-goal to make it 3-20.

As the home team grew into the match, they began to threaten the RHC line, with Hamish Munro and Patterson combining well in midfield, whie Jason Riley was a threat from number eight.

Slick handling nearly put full-back Cunningham away, but his final kick through was too strong and the visitors were able to touch down for a 22m dropout.

And it took until the 76th minute for PL to make the breakthrough, as the ball was well worked to Patrick Cooney, who had enough room to dive over in the corner.

The conversion was wide, on what was a disappointing first outing of the year for the Pennypit club, as they fell to fifth in National 3 and dropped seven points behind second-placed Dumfries Saints.

PL will have a chance to bounce back tomorrow (Saturday) when they travel west to take on strugglers Dalziel.

Preston Lodge: D Cunningham, P Glynn, A Jessop, H Munro, P Cooney; G Patterson, C Simpson; N Hart, R Mackie, P Dixon, J Sked, B Cowan, R Runciman, C Dixon, J Riley.