Titans crash to Esher defeat

TITANS head for Birmingham and Solihull on Wednesday night with some harsh words ringing in their ears after Saturday's shock 23-19 defeat at Esher.

The Surrey setback, as Rotherham threw away a ten-point lead in the final 20 minutes, gave the bottom four sides a glimmer of hope in the chase to catch the Clifton Lane men and dump them in the relegation play-offs for the third straight season.

And defeat at Birmingham this week will certainly set the alarm bells clanging.

Early tries from James Sandford and Juan Socino should have build a platform for success at Esher while Jonny Hampsey's second half score from a Matty James interception put them 19-9 up with a quarter of the game to go.

But Mike Schmid's Esher, fighting for their lives, ran in two late converted tries for the win.

Said coach Andre Bester: "We shoudl have won but we gave it away. It wasn't good enough and I told the players that. We have to go to Birmingham and win."

Wednesday's game starts at 7.30pm.