A SECOND successive victory for Kidderminster Carolians has placed a comfortable cushion between the-mselves and the Midlands Three West North drop-zone.

The Marlpool Lane men followed up their win at Willenhall with a vital 22-12 victory over fellow relegation strugglers Telford on Saturday.

An indication of their improvement was KCs' disappointment that the winning scoreline was not greater than 10 points after a series of wasted chances.

However the victory takes them up another place in the table, leaping Telford and building a four point gap between them and the bottom two.

Although the game began in drizzly conditions, there was some good rugby played in the opening minutes with Telford opening the scoring through Gareth Evans' fourth minute penalty.

KCs were soon in front when Andy Stooksbury responded by converting two penalties of his own before Evans missed and scored one to make it all square at 6-6.

With the hosts dominant in all deprtments, two more Stooksbury kicks put them 12-6 up at the break, although it could have been more had KCs not failed to deliver the final pass on several occasions.

Telford's Evans was on target with a penalty in the first minute of the new half, but they could not do much against an in-form Kidderminster side who tackled extremely well.

It took until the 51st minute for KCs to add to their total when a good move ended up with winger James Guest weaving his way through to score on the left.

Twenty minutes later it was the determination of Ambro Neri that took him over for KCs second try and a 22-9 lead.

A fourth penalty success for Evans ended the scoring and Telford finished well beaten.

Director of rugby Phil Knowles was delighted with the second win in a fortnight, saying: "We did waste some chances by failing to get in the final pass, but we are very happy to have secured two points and built up a gap between us and the bottom two."

KCs have a friendly away at Kings Norton on Saturday with the seconds playing host to the same opponents and the thirds entertaining Ledbury, all 2.15pm kick offs.

The seconds and thirds completed a winning treble for the club with victories over Telford and Harborne.

Tries from Billy Chiverton, Jon Shires and Dave Betson, along with two Iain Crockett conversions, helped the seconds to a 19-5 away win.

And Adrian Taft, Grant Stewart, Jon Laight and Roger Punton were on target as the thirds won 20-13.