SWINDON rugby club are now just two wins away from playing at the iconic Twickenham Stadium after a 42-14 victory over Reading in their RFU Intermediate Cup Semi Final.

The Southern Counties South outfit dominated Southern Counties North equivalents Reading at Greenbridge Road last Saturday after a spicy first half that saw hosts Swindon reduced to 14 men.

With Nick Brooks’ men narrowly ahead at the break, further yellow cards were dished out for home players before discipline was reigned in and Swindon ran away to create a healthy margin of victory.

Brooks had previously thought his side were just a pair of wins away from walking out on the hallowed turf in Twickenham, however victory on Saturday saw the situation clarified for all involved.

Into the Southern Counties Final, victory would put Brooks’ men on the brink of history.

Looking back at the weekend’s win though, the Swindon coach was slightly taken aback at how large the margin of victory turned out to be, especially given the feisty start.

Brooks said: “We had no indication of that being the scoreline at any given time.

“The game started off quite fierce and quite tense. It was tit for tat – they scored a penalty early on and then we counteracted that with a penalty of our own.

“We lost a player due to ill-discipline – it was a game that was marred by that on our side. We had three yellow cards throughout which didn’t help us, but it was quite a good, aggressive game in the way that rugby should be played.

“But in the second half, our game plan and our ability to use our bench to it’s full potential really seemed to turn Reading upside down.”

With the score at 10-6 at the break, Brooks knew his half-time team talk would be one of the most important of the season.

The Swindon chief insisted he said nothing special, but just reminded his players that discipline would be key if their collective quality was to shine through.

Brooks said: “Our half-time chat consisted of telling the guys to calm down, respect the referee and do the basics right.

“We knew that if we played our natural game and had confidence in each other, we would be ok.

“Our ball carries seemed to gain a second wind after half-time and started running really hard at them.

“We were breaking tackles left, right and centre – from then, the scoreline kept on ticking over and we just blew them away.”