Canterbury suffered a third away defeat of the National 2 South season as they crumbled to a 43-12 reverse at Taunton Titans on Saturday.

The hosts ran-in six tries as they swept to the top of the table with an accomplished performance, while some defensive lapses, poor handling and ill-discipline saw an injury-hit city club contribute to their own downfall.

Some slack defence allowed skipper Dan Lee through for the first try, while scrum-half Lewis Webb nipped through a gap at a ruck after a spell of pressure to extend the lead.

A Gary Kingdom slotted a penalty and converted both scores, while the hosts could have been further ahead as some fine defending from Canterbury twice saw the hosts held up over the line.

The only Canterbury try came in the opening minute of the second half when Tom Best and the back division created space for Martyn Beaumont to race through and score by the posts, with Ollie Best’s conversion cutting the deficit.

Just four minutes later however the visitors coughed up posession and were punished with the Titans’ third try from prop Jake Woolmore, which all-but secured the points for the hosts.

Despite a battling display from centre Alex Veale the hosts added tries through Alex Wilcoxon, Ollie Massey-Birch and Kingdom, who converted all three.

The city club did however have the final say as they engineered space for Mason Rosvall to blaze over out wide, though it could not prevent the visitors from slipping to 11th in the table.