Cornish Pirates coach Ian Davies happy with 'arm-wrestle' win

Cornish Pirates coach Ian Davies believes his side's 16-13 win over Bedford proved his players have the ability to win tight games.

The Pirates' potential with ball in hand has been shown by two bonus-point victories in the league this year, but Sunday's win was more attritional.

"Unfortunately conditions didn't allow either side to express themselves," Davies told BBC Radio Cornwall.

"It was an arm wrestle which we didn't want, but we're glad to take the win."

The Pirates have won six of their last seven games and lie fifth in the Championship table, but were pushed hard by the struggling Blues.

"We said this was an opportunity and we came up with the goods," Davies continued.

"I thought we should have had a penalty try either at the maul or the scrum but we didn't. That was probably the buffer we needed to relax and we knew Bedford would come back at us.

"It was a solid display but we were a little bit inaccurate, especially in the first half.

"People will look at Tom Shannon's throwing in terms of the line-outs we lost but it was the lifts - we have to keep people in the air and we didn't.

"And we were disappointing in the scrum, we weren't getting the collectiveness that we try to get. We had a few choice words at half-time - Alan Paver certainly told everyone how things weren't happening and we turned it around a little bit."

Bedford are traditionally one of the sides fighting it out for the play-off spots in the Championship, but defeat by the Pirates means they have still won just one game all season.

"You look at their team and they've got a lot of quality and experience but they're just not clicking at the moment - I'm just glad they didn't click against us."