The looming showdown between Cornwall's fiercest rivals has gained massive significance following the first round of matches in National League One.

Both Redruth and the Cornish All Blacks lost their opening fixtures and both will come out firing on Saturday at Polson Bridge, where derby encounters between the two great Cornish protagonists are full-blooded affairs at the best of times.

And these are not the best of times for either club. The All Blacks are currently in liquidation and labouring under an RFU-imposed 20-point penalty as a consequence. They kicked off their National One campaign with a 26-18 defeat at Rosslyn Park and will be bottom of the league for many weeks to come, at least until their points tally enters positive territory.

Redruth endured their own financial woes last season but although they lost on Saturday – a 16-15 home defeat by Wharfedale – it was a game in which they were palpably the stronger side and unlucky to lose.

"We're absolutely gutted: we've had all the possession and lost the game at the death," said Redruth skipper Darren Jacques, whose side were leading 15-9 until deep into the second half before a line-out error allowed Wharfedale to score under the posts and sneak an unjustified victory.

Jacques said: "We've got no-one to blame but ourselves; we had enough possession to win the game and then conceded a straightforward try which really killed us. Now we'll go away, regroup and make sure we're up for the trip to Launceston and look to give them a hard time."

Redruth paid the price for attempting to play 15-man rugby against a Yorkshire side that was bristling with pace and power in a back division that relished the firm conditions underfoot. Jacques knows a more controlled approach will be needed against the well-disciplined All Blacks, who have never lost at home in the league to their near neighbours.

He said: "We tried to be a bit more expansive and give our backs a chance but we went too wide too quick; we were forcing the ball and we maybe should have stuck it our jumper and hung on to it."

Redruth certainly paid the price for a failure to build through the phases and they will surely be exposed again should they fail to get more structure into their game at Polson Bridge. Saturday's effort was by no means a poor performance: the Cornishmen were stronger up front, their backs were full of running and defensively they were sound. However, the Reds coaches know that more control is needed and director of rugby Dave Penberthy is now focused on that objective.

He said after Saturday's defeat: "We lost the game, there's no point in dwelling on it, we've got a huge game next week and we've got to go to Launceston believing we can win. We will certainly need more direction up there and we will work very hard this week to put things right."

The All Blacks meanwhile have their own on-fields problems to resolve follow an error-strewn performance at Priory Lane where Rosslyn Park's two tries were both aided by the visitors' failure to get the basic right.

"I hope we just had a bad day at the office," said joint coach Tony Roques. "We have some hard lessons to learn but there were good points to. When we were good we were very good."