The home side started confidently, as was to be expected from the League leaders and, with a strong edge in the early set scrums and the breeze at their backs, they spent most of the first ten minutes in the Stortford 22. The visitors, though demonstrated from the outset, that they were up for the battle and defended strongly, when needed and ran strongly even from close to their own line, when possession was won. After 10 minutes, this aggressive approach paid dividends, when a perfectly timed, short pass from Tom Coleman close to his own 22 found Johnny Neville running a great liner to burst free and push the opposition onto the back foot in their own half. Quick support took the team into the Cambridge 22 and extreme pressure at a ruck produced good ball, which was moved first left and then right to create an overlap, which Nick Hankin exploited to the full by stepping inside a covering defender to run in for an opening try. George Cullen's conversion attempt into the wind drifted narrowly wide. Cambridge flew back onto the offensive and it took some magnificent tackling from the whole Stortford team to stop them from scoring - albeit aided by a bad penalty goal miss by the home side from in front of the posts, after 15 minutes. Cambridge, with their scrum still operating well, had the better of the subsequent exchanges and, eventually, were rewarded with a try to Mike Ayrton after 25 minutes, when the winger took a smart pass inside to crash over under the posts after scrumhalf, Stef. Liebenberg had broken wide from the base of a maul. Amazingly, the conversion attempt barely left the ground, to leave the scores tied at 5-5. Stortford now enjoyed their own period of pressure and Cullen came very close to scoring a great individual try after 29 minutes, when he cut inside, after good teamwork had stretched the home defence and then stepped a couple of cover defenders to reach the line, but a last-ditch tackle form a third defender dislodged the ball as he dived for the line. Not to be denied, though, Stortford retained the initiative and were eventually rewarded with a try scored by Baxter Wilson from a driving maul, off a position created by a fantastic runback by Sam Winter of a long Cambridge kick out of defence and some smart support play. Cullen this time nailed a difficult conversion to take his side out to a 7 point lead, which was successfully defended until half time.

With the breeze at their backs, Stortford pressed Cambridge back into their 22 at the start of the second period and more strong tackling and quick line speed forced an attempted chip kick, as the home side tried to emulate the visitors' first half efforts in running out of defence. The ball though cannoned into George Cullen, who seized on the bouncing ball and dashed over the line for a vital third try out wide after only 2 minutes of the half. His own conversion attempt drifted wide, but Stortford came straight back onto the attack from the restart. The forwards launched a series of driving mauls at the Cambridge line, forcing a series of penalties, the third of which brought a yellow card for No 4, George Bretag-Norris. Cambridge defended desperately against a number of further forward drives at their line, but their resistance was broken after 51 minutes, when scrumhalf, Tom Banks took matters into his own hands to dodge his way over for the bonus point try from the base of yet another maul. Cullen made an excellent conversion to take his side out to a 19 point lead. Although, understandably shaken by the battering they had been taking, Cambridge fought back with some spirit and, aided somewhat by Stortford's failure to take a couple of opportunities for relieving kicks, compounded by the concession of two penalties in quick succession, snatched a try back, after Richard Gill - possibly rather harshly - was yellow-carded for the second offence. It was Liebenberg again, who took advantage - this time scoring himself, as he plunged over from the base of a ruck on the Stortford line. A successful conversion took the score to 12-24 after 61 minutes and, with only 14 men for the next 8 minutes or so, Stortford might well have come under pressure.. In fact, though, they rallied tremendously and enjoyed much the better of the subsequent exchanges, as the pack, with replacement props, Tom McCrone and Rory Young making a real impact, began to dominate the scrums. It was. perhaps fitting, therefore that the game was wrapped up, shortly after Gill's return to the fray, when Young dived over from a maul created by one of a series of dominant Stortford scrums on the Cambridge line. It was yet another determined snipe from Tom Banks, which created the opening for the prop and rounded off what had been a superb all-round performance by the scrumhalf, both in attack and defence.

This though was a victory won by great teamwork, built on total commitment from all 18 players that got onto the pitch who - as Cambridge's Captain admitted after the game - had wanted the win more than their opposition and managed to combine this with by far the best collective performance of the season. Congratulations to all concerned on a great win. A mention also has to go to the hordes of supporters who made the trip up the M11 to cheer on our team. We must have come close to outnumbering the home fans and certainly made a lot more noise than they did!