Newport Throw League Title Wide Open Again

Newport defeated Pontypridd by 34-23 at Rodney Parade to give themselves one last chance of taking the Welsh/Scottish league title, but they have to rely on Cardiff preventing a Llanelli win on Friday evening.
Newport, with several players missing through injury, beat a makeshift Pontypridd side, whose eyes were more on the forthcoming Principality Cup and Parker Pen Shield finals.
The try-count was 4-3 to Newport, though it took a try in the final minute by no.8 Andrew Powell to finally kill off a splendid Pontypridd effort.
Matt Mostyn, again having to play at centre, Ben Breeze and Jason Forster had scored the earlier Newport tries, while Shane Howarth landed all four conversions as well as a penalty and full back Mat Pini dropped a goal.
Sonny Parker came on as a replacement to score one of the Pontypridd tries with scrum half Gareth Baber and wing Gareth Wyat supplying the others and Nicky Little kicked two penalties and a conversion.
There were yellow cards for Breeze and his Pontypridd opponents Sven Cronk and Matthew Rees in an exciting match well controlled by Paul Adams and before a crowd of around 5,000.
Newport play their last match against Bridgend at Rodney Parade on Saturday (5.30pm), while Pontypridd will then be entertaining Edinburgh at Sardis Road (2.30pm).