SCAA First Pacific Causeway Bay Phoenix beat Transact24 Tai Po Dragons 22-15 in the KPMG Women’s Premiership Development competition tonight. Kowloon beat City 52-5 in the other Premiership Development match as the league tables slowly take shape with one round remaining before all eight Premiership sides re-group for the Grand Championship play-offs.

In KPMG Women’s Premiership Elite action, ECO Gai Wu Falcons kept their talons on first place with a 36-15 win over Borrelli Walsh USRC Tigers. Societe Generale Valley re-started their winningstreak at one, (after their previous run was halted by Falcons last week at 51 games), with a 33-22 win over Natixis HKFC Ice.

In the game of the week, a strong start for Causeway Bay saw them on the board first with a try to Ho Hau-yan in the fifth minute,before Dragons replied with a back row try of their own from No.8 Fan Ying-Tung to level the scores at 5-all after the opening quarter.

Tai Po then suffered back-to-back sin-binnings that saw them play out the remainder of the opening half at uneven strength. Causeway Bay capitalized on their numerical advantage and a tiring Dragons defence to run in two moretries in the final two minutes of the opening half, with Kong Yin-ting and Li Sze-ting both crossing over. A single conversion gave Causeway Bay what seemed an unassailable 17-5 lead at the break.

The second half would prove to be a near mirror of the first - but in reverse - as Phoenix this time were burned by yellow cards, losing two players down the stretch to the naughty chair as both sides struggled with the referee’s interpretation at the breakdown.

Tai Po returned the first half favours, capitalising on bothbenchingsthroughtries with scrumhalf Wong Wing-ying striking first with a try on the hour mark to pull her side to within a converted try of the lead, trailing 17-10.

Causeway Bay’s second yellow came in the 64th minute as winger Hau Sin-man was sent off for holding onto the ball in the ruck under pressure from the Tai Po attack. Dragons’ Kwok Ka-mei scored a minute into Hau’s penalty to pull Tai Po to within two points,trailing 17-15 with 13 minutes left on the clock.

The game was in the balance when Hau came back on to the park and redeemed herself by scoring the game winner in injury time. Hau’s try unfolded from a breakdown at the lineout on the opposite side of the pitch. Phoenix recovered quickly and pushed the ball wide to the now rested wingerwho was on hand for the easy finish as Causeway Bay ran out 22-15 winners.

Coach Chris Lin was pleased to have gotten the result from a ding-dong battle.

“It was a tough game as expected but it’s good to come away with the last-minute win. Our bench was a key to the win as they were a bit fresher than Tai Po, who were fielding a few players that had already played earlier in the day.

“Full credit to Dragons, they put up a tough fight despite having players backing up for a second game. They have some really strong ball carriers who posed real problems for us.”

Today’s results move Causeway Bay into tied-second on the table with Kowloon on 15 points. Both sides trail leaders Dragons on 20 points.

With a final game against City on the schedule, Causeway Bay also has a chance at sole possession of second at the end of the season and an advantageous play-off bracket for the Grand Championships.

“We play City next week and will be targeting a bonus point Hopefully, Dragons can beat Kowloon next weekend as well and give us sole possession of second place ahead of the Grand Championships,” said Lin.

Causeway Bay’s late season run is looking well timed and Lin is pleased at his side’s mounting confidence.

“We have put together a couple of good wins in a row and if we can continue our progress I don’t see why we can’t challenge the teams in the elite Premiership in the Grand Championships,” said Lin.

In lower league action, Revolution SRC Ladies beat Societe Generale Valley Red Ladies, one place below them in KPMG National League 1, 29-20 to retain the KPMG NL 1 Challenge Shield for a fourth week.Meanwhile, Police Sirens retained the KPMG National League 2 Challenge Shield for a second week as they overcame ECO Gai Wu Hawks, 49-0.