Redbacks are already within reach of first innings points after rolling Rugby for 167 and getting themselves to 1-134 by the end of the day's play at the Sportsground.

Coughlan claimed figures of 3-12 as he took apart Rugby's tail, and he'll still be out in the middle this Saturday when he resumes at 86 not out alongside Mark Day (29).

The Redbacks captain and Ben Orme (23) got the chase underway in the right fashion with their 68-run partnership.

Rugby weren't without their chances to end the opening partnership sooner but were punished for missing the opportunities which came their way.

Mick Tobin was the other standout performer for Redbacks. He claimed figures of 3-24 from nine overs and picked up the key wicket of Rugby captain Imran Qureshi for 42.

Coughlan said his team had the right attitude before the first ball had even been bowled.

"Hard work pays off. I wanted my team to be there on time, and they were, and they were ready to warm up. It showed on the field," he said.

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"I feel for Imran and the club because they had around 15 blokes pull out across all grades so it's hard to get a team together when you have that many players pull out at the last minute."

Big performances with the bat were hard to come by for Rugby.

Qureshi and fellow opener Cameron Smith (21) made an encouraging opening stand of 57 but from that point things took a downward trajectory.

Jono Colley (33) provided a middle order boost and Niraj Dhakal (44) was the best performer of the innings down at number nine.

No-one else reached double figures.

"Everything just fell into place. I'd make a bowling or fielding change, and a catch would go to that bloke. It was just one of those days," Coughlan said.

"They weren't taking their chances when we did. Ormey and I probably gave them two or three early on and they're the ones you have to take in first grade.

"Ormey and I were out in the middle and talking about how we had to settle down a bit. We were trying to overplay our hands a bit going from the nets to the Sportsground, which we all know is low and slow.

"Short rain delays put some moisture in the deck so we reassessed and slowed up a bit when we lost Benny for 23 and Mark and I just wanted to take it into next week."