Continuing to pile on the pressure, the visitors pinned Sils on their own line for the next ten minutes but fine defending from the hosts ensured they did not concede again during that spell.

In fact the next points came the home side’s way when Steve Hawkins sent a penalty through the posts to cut the gap to four points.

A sin-binning did little to help Sils’ cause as they came under pressure in the scrum and Berkswell took advantage to go 19-8 ahead thanks to a converted try on the half-hour.

The final score of the first half went Sils way with another penalty reducing the gap to eight points. They did however, at least end the half back to a full contingent of 15 which still gave them everything to play for in the second half.

It was Berkswell’s turn to lose a player to the sin-bin shortly after the restart and in much the same way they made Sils pay, the hosts returned the favour with a converted try from Steve Hall.

But as quickly as they got themselves back into the contest, Sils allowed the gap to open up again as they conceded an unconverted try.

Berkswell then lost another body to the sin-bin and Sils quickly got on to the front again, reducing the gap to 24-23 when Matt Lee crossed in the corner.

There were just four minutes left on the clock when Sils got their noses ahead for the first time, Ollie Beech scoring a fine individual converted try to give his side a six-point lead.

Beech struck again in the closing seconds to put the result beyond doubt and leave captain Pete Nicholls to say: “It was a close encounter, Berkswell are a tough outfit.

“We left it late but scored some great tries. We have lots of work to do over the next three weeks and will work hard in training, but I’m delighted with the team.”

Sils’ next task is a trip to Burton on Saturday.