It was a battle between the boot of home full back Nick Gale and the try scoring power of Neath hooker Sion Crocker.
Gale kicked five penalties to keep his side in touch with their visitors, while Crocker plundered four of his side’s five tries as their driving maul came up trumps for them once again. Gale gave his side an early 6-0 lead before the first of Crocker’s tries.
It was 17-9 to Neath at the break before a third Gale penalty cut the gap to five points early in the second half. Two more Crocker tries not only earned the bonus-point, but also saw off the Otters.
Ystrad Rhondda notched 10 tries in their 64-29 home win over Ystalyfera to make it five wins in a row. There were two each for Cole Morgan and Kelly Jones and one apiece for Cavan Davies, Garyn Davies, Alex Webber, Nathan Hughes, Kurtis Williams and Kelly Jones. Rhys Truelove kicked five conversion and Josh Williams added two more.
Ystalyfera left with one point after scoring four tries from Tomos Powell, Ben Williams, Steff and Ioan Ohes, with Sam Comley kicking nine points.
Cardiff Met were still very much in the contest at Bargoed when they changed ends only three points behind, at 17-14, but the second half belonged almost solely to the Bulls. The home side scored 33 points and conceded a mere five as they romped to a 50-19 to stay in third place.
Beddau picked up a great 34-24 win at Bedwas, despite conceding a second minute try to Lloyd Wilkins, They replied with tries from Ewan Roberts and Cody Baker. Roberts went on to score a second as Beddau notched five tries to leave with the full five points.
Pontypool were forced to play with 14 men for 52 minutes at Trebanos after Pat Lewis saw red or reacting to a challenge.
Even so, the unbeaten Championship leaders were still able to make light work of the second of their three successive away days as they bagged seven tries in a 45-7 win that extended their unbeaten run to 14 games.
Pooler had already scored twice to take a 12 point lead before Lewis received his marching orders for starting a mini-melee after his pushing and shoving with an opposing forward.
Huw Anderson ran in the first try for the visitors in the fourth minute and then fellow wing Matthew Powell followed suit midway through the first half. Matthew Jarvis converted the latter.
Peter Lloyd completed the first-half scoring with a try from a driving line-out to leave Pontypool leading 17-0. The relentless power of the Pooler forwards then took over in the second half and the bonus-point try came up two minutes after the break when skipper Scott Matthews crossed.
There were two more driving line scores and a penalty try to complete the Pooler scoring, while Trebanos got off the mark with an interception try eight minutes from time.
