THERE was joy for Cornwall but frustration for Devon on the opening day of the County Championship.

Graham Dawe’s Cornwall team, runners-up for the past two seasons, made a stunning start to their Division One campaign by beating Gloucestershire 27-8 at Cinderford.

Cornwall stormed into a 22-3 half-time lead thanks to two tries by young winger Robin Wedlake and one from centre Jake Murphy.

Impressive scrum-half Matt Shepherd added a fourth try after the interval before Gloucestershire, who were able to call on more higher league players, did score a late consolation effort through Leo Fielding.

But Devon’s hopes of earning promotion back to the top flight of county rugby suffered a blow when they narrowly lost 34-31 against Somerset at Taunton in Division Two.

Devon paid for a disappointing first half where they found themselves 26-5 down. However, they scored 26 unanswered points after the interval to give Somerset a major fright.

In the end the difference between the sides was a Joe Hall penalty, with both scoring five tries and three conversions.

Tom Goodman scored two of Devon’s five tries, with their others coming from scrum-half Jordan Petherbridge, Sam Thomas and Matt Templeton, with young Joe Simmonds kicking three conversions.

This coming weekend, Cornwall travel to Kent, while Devon host North Midlands at Brixham.