Ampthill 38 - Bishop's Stortford 1st XV 25

Having been hit by yet more injuries since last week's disappointing performance, Stortford could have been forgiven for approaching this visit to ambitious Ampthill with some trepidation, but this was not at all apparent from this game. The bulk of the creative rugby was, in fact, played by the visitors and it was only a couple of crucial errors on their part that opened up the way for the home side's dominant forwards, including former international, Darren Morris to close out the game at the end.

The first threat of the game came from Stortford, when a dart by scrumhalf, Arran Mahoney was seized on by Marcus Cattell to give Ben de Grandis room in the centre and winger, Jack Knowles was stopped only inches short. The visitors maintained the pressure and eventually forced a penalty after some 15 minutes, which Tom Coleman kicked for a 0-3 lead. Adventurous play from the resultant dropout took Stortford into home territory again and a good outside break by de Grandis set up a position for flanker, Maehe Austin to be driven over for an unconverted try. A crucial turning point came after 25 minutes when Stortford's backs were, once again exerting pressure, but, instead of ploughing on through the close support available, a miss-pass was thrown and this was plucked out of the air at the second or third attempt by Ampthill and two passes later, their fullback touched down for a converted try. A second Stortford error, some 15 minutes later doubled the home score when good scrummage ball was won in a defensive scrum by the visitors, but the attempted clearance kick was charged down and the ball settled down perfectly over the line for an easy home try, which was duly converted. There remained only sufficient time in the first half for the Ampthill number 1 to be yellow carded for an offence at the breakdown.

Stortford started the second half in the same aggressive manner as they had the first and after 5 minutes were rewarded with a try by Marcus Cattell bursting through the heart of Ampthill's defence from a position created by a clever blindside break by Mahoney and hooker, Declan Caulfield. Coleman converted to take the visitors into a one point lead. Ampthill now responded more positively and set up a spell of pressure on the Stortford line, which brought a yellow card for skipper Mark McCraith, deemed to have killed the ball at a crucial ruck. Almost inevitably, the big home pack quickly capitalised on the 7 man Stortford scrum to register a pushover try. Within 10 minutes, though, Stortford were back within 1 point, when Ampthill conceded a penalty for offside in midfield, which Coleman duly converted. Lifted by this, the Stortford backs launched a further assault on the suspect Ampthill defence, but a speculative chip on halfway was run back so well by the home side that they were able for the first time to stretch the Stortford defence and score a good try to widen the margin to 6 points. Yellow cards shown after 20 and 28 minutes to an Ampthill centre for a reckless high tackle and their right wing for a breakdown offence appeared to offer Stortford a golden opportunity to turn the game in their favour. However, in attempting to press through mid field, a penalty was conceded as a Stortford player got isolated and the resultant kick to the corner set up a period of relentless forward pressure from the home side, producing another pushover try which this time was converted. Stortford were not finished, though and, within 5 minutes were back within bonus point range through a converted try by Coleman, scored after a great breakout by replacement backrow, Damian Sangster and Mark McCraith from a freekick awarded at a scrum. Ampthill's forward control was soon reestablished, however, closing out any chance that the visitors might have had to capitalise on the home side's lack of numbers in the backs. It was almost inevitable that this new-found pre-eminence of their pack would produce more points for Ampthill and, sure enough, with time running out they set up camp on the Stortford line and eventually forced a penalty try to deprive their opponents of what would have been a well-deserved losing bonus point.

This was a much-improved performance by Stortford and they must look to produce a similarly spirited team effort next week in the home game against Staines if we are to move back up the League table.