Bournemouth Director Of Rugby Will Croker said his side’s 30-13 bonus-point win at fourth placed Exmouth sent out a message to the rest of their South West Premier chasing rivals.
The Fortitudo-backed away side had to wait until a minute into added time until Grant Hancox slid over for their ninth bonus point in their opening 10 games, but Croker said it was worth the wait.
He said: “They are a hard team to break down, they were at home, they were going to keep going and they were unbeaten at home, so they were always going to keep going, so it was worth the wait.
“But we just had to show that bit of mental fortitude because we had a few guys carrying knocks but they still stuck to their task and I am really, really pleased with the score at the end.
“It makes the long bus journey back to Bournemouth all that much better when you return with the five points in the bag.
“That was another game where the opposition have not got anything from it at all so we are 100 per cent so far this seasoning that respect - nobody has taken a single point off of us - so we are delighted with that and now we have just got to look forward to next weeks’ game against Ivybridge.”
Fourth placed Exmouth made life extremely difficult for the division leaders by pegging them back every time they opened up a little bit of breathing space.
But Croker said his team knuckled down and stuck to their task well before they came away with their sixth away win out of six so far this season.
Despite being 12-10 down at the break, the visitors fought back to triumph over the hosts and Croker said his side mastered the basics well to inflict their first home defeat of the season.
He added: “We are really, really pleased with that, I thought in the second half we showed a lot of control.
“We got dominance in the areas of the park which we wanted to be dominant in - our scrum was good and our defensive organisation was good.
“When we had the ball, we kept it much better in the second half then we did in the first half, and that is a good win away from home.
“They are a good team and they kept the ball for long periods and we had to defend for long periods but I am really, really pleased with that.”