Canterbury were made to pay for a disastrous first-half performance as they slipped to a 36-19 defeat on the long trip to Cornwall to face Redruth on Saturday.

The hosts ran-in five first-half tries to pave the way for their National 2 South victory but Canterbury came close to a deserved bonus point after a second-half comeback.

A city club depleted by injury and unavailability made a slow start and two simple errors gave the unbeaten hosts a 10-0 lead with two tries in the opening six minutes.

Tom Best replied with a try, which he converted himself, on 17 minutes but injuries to key men Mike Melford and Ross Comfort made things difficult for Canterbury and the hosts replied with a burst of three tries in 10 minutes before the break to take a commanding lead.

Another try moments after the restart made it 36-7 however Canterbury rallied in the final 20 minutes, despite losing skipper Pete Kelly to injury, and David Devlin-Jones pulled a score back and Alex Veale added another, converted by Best, to make it 36-19.

However they spurned two good chances of an all-important fourth try in the final few moments and left Cornwall empty-handed.