BOURNEMOUTH coach Craig White is confident the club’s young Lions are cut out to deal with the pressure and intensity of a relegation battle.

Teenagers Sam Knott, Hamish Renwick and Lewis Dennett have all been blooded in a highly-competitive National Three South West division this season.

Lock Knott scored his maiden try in Lions’ 13-10 defeat by Bracknell six days ago and fly-half Dennett kicked the other five points from a conversion and penalty.

Both Knott and openside flanker Renwick have made two starts for the first team, while Dennett was handed his debut on the opening day at Oxford Harlequins and has appeared in 16 league matches.

The trio of 18-year-olds are products of the club’s flourishing academy section with five other youngsters – Matthew Goddard, James Fisher, Jed Wallace, Jamie O’Leary and Ollie Kent – currently training with the first team.

Fellow graduate Charlie Morris-Mean is available to turn out when he is not required by the Bath academy, having joined their development programme four years ago, while Ben Meaden also featured for Bournemouth this season before being snapped up by the Bedford academy.

White told the Daily Echo: “Sam, Hamish and Lewis have all taken their chances and we have been very impressed with them.

“They have trained hard and you have to give guys a chance. If they are good enough, they must play and you can’t wait until they are a certain age.

“We have seen them improve week by week. If we don’t give them an opportunity, they might disappear and go somewhere else.

“As a club, we have to think of the future. We need to start increasing the size of the first-team squad because you can use between 40 and 60 players in a season at this level and you need depth.

“We have to win games to make sure we don’t get relegated but these guys are performing at a level we are happy with and we don’t have any qualms about playing them.”

White added: “The academy is something which maybe has been underutilised. We have had a chat with the chairman and academy coaches and want to make it more inclusive.

“We have another five lads training with us with a view to potentially playing them before the end of the season. They will certainly get our backing.”

Ninth-placed Lions on Saturday travel to Weston-super-Mare where they will face high-flying Hornets, the first of three games against clubs currently in the top seven.

Lions: (from) Hancox, Sutherland, Higgins, Chislett, Fitch, Dennett, Hardcastle, Terry, Manning, Firetto, Knott, Scott, Hennings, Renwick, Rees, Bovett, Roberts, Benham.