THOMAS BALL produced a moment of magic in the 75th minute of this close encounter to give Preston a deserved victory in a game that was strewn with handling errors from both sides and could have gone either way.

Caldy fly half Richard Vasey kicked six penalties to keep the game within touching distance with Preston scoring three tries to Caldy’s none.

The early stages of the game were fairly cagey with both sides struggling to find any rhythm.

Preston were first on the score sheet after 15 minutes when Caldy were adjudged to have been offside at the breakdown and Preston fly half Mark Edwards duly kicked the goal.

Richard Vasey hit straight back for Caldy after Preston committed a similar offence two minutes later.

On 19 minutes, a sublime kick from Edwards into the Caldy try area caught the defence napping and inside centre Zavallis-Roebuck beat the covering Soutar and touched down for Preston’s first try, which Edwards converted.

Vasey kicked two further penalties to keep Caldy in the hunt but the second half started with the second Preston try as winger Matthew Hughes touched down after setting off from his own half.

Richard Vasey had an excellent day with the boot as he kicked three further penalties to give Caldy a hard earned lead but Ball then evaded several Caldy tacklers and showed great pace as he ran down the left wing to score out wide.

The Preston line, which was excellent in defence all day, then held all Caldy could throw at them.