Cornish Pirates boss hails 'fantastic' 32-17 Bristol win

Cornish Pirates head coach Ian Davies says his side's 32-17 win over Bristol was a "fantastic performance".

The victory put the Pirates into the Championship top four as Phil Burgess, Kieran Hallett, Ben Mercer and Tom Riley all scored tries.

"2012 wasn't quite a good start but today was a fantastic performance," Davies told BBC Radio Cornwall.

"Our character was outstanding and I think we fully deserved the try at the end to get the bonus point."

The Pirates led 18-3 at half-time thanks to a Burgess try, and a penalty, conversion, drop goal and try from the impressive fly-half Hallett.

Kyle Traynor went over 12 minutes after the re-start to put Bristol within eight points, but Mercer replied to bring the lead back to 15 points.

Marco Mama scored a second for Bristol five minutes before the end but Riley's try right at the death secured a bonus point for the Pirates.

"In the first half we were very good in what we set out to do, we looked at a lot of footage of what Bristol would try to bring and we stayed on script," Davies said.

"We were disappointed to go in 18-3 to be honest.

"In the second half we knew Liam Middleton would get them fired up, they did that, they threw everything at us and got back into it.

"But our character was outstanding and I think we fully deserved the try at the end to get the bonus point."