Staines 11 Bishop's Stortford 1st XV 24

Early nerves were apparent on both sides, but it was the home side that got off to the better start, going through a number of phases after a mishit opening drop out by Stortford to establish position in the visitors' half. This pressure brought rapid dividends with an offside penalty converted by fullback, Michael Forster after three minutes, but the same player was unable to add another score 4 minutes later, when Stortford were penalised in a pretty central position for not rolling away after a tackle. The visitors responded positively to this let-off but, ironically it was pressure from their pack at a Staines scrum in the home teams' half after quarter of an hour that seemed to unbalance their defence and the Staines backrow seized on the opportunity to burst upfield to the opposing 22, where good support from their flyhalf and fullback saw the latter sidestepping over for a try close to the posts. The conversion was missed to leave the score at 8-0. It took Stortford only 3 minutes to narrow the gap, however, with a penalty from Sam Coleman for offside. The visitors then slowly moved into the ascendencey, which finally brought its reward after 39 minutes when Wayne Child burst through from the blindside wing to take a short inside pass from Sam Coleman to cross the line under the posts. By this stage, Coleman was standing in at flyhalf, after Tom Walsh had suffered a hamstring pull only 10 minutes into the game to be replaced by Sam Winter, who took Coleman's place at fullback. Coleman duly converted the try to move Stortford into the lead for the first time and things moved further in the visitors' favour when, as the resultant drop-out was taken, Staines' spiky hooker, Liam Shanahan was yellow-carded apparently for a comment made to the referee. Stortford duly swept back onto the attack, but were held out until the break.

The second half picked up in the same vain as the first had finished, however, and over the first five minutes Stortford put together a passage of good fifteen man rugby, starting with a 20 metre driving maul straight from the kick-off. Some impressive interpassing between forwards and backs followed, in which second row, David Rose and Sam Winter were prominent, first enabling flanker Maehe Austin to go close on the wide left with Skipper, Mark McCraith then plunging over for a try to the right of the posts from the base of a maul. Coleman converted to take the score to 8-17. It was McCraith again who got his second try, and his team's third 20 minutes into the half, bursting over from 10 metres out, with Rose again showing up in support of a fantastic solo break out of his own 22 by centre, Ben de Grandis, weaving his way through heavy traffic all the way to the other 22. Another Colaman conversion took the score to 8-24, but the game was not over and the home side swept onto the offensive and for a while Stortford were unable to clear their lines. Determined Stortford defending managed to keep the opposition out until 35 minutes into the half, when a penalty against centre Jono Child for failing to release after a tackle was kicked by Staines' substitute fullback, who had come on some 15 minutes earlier. The home side flew back onto the offence, but good tackling and some fine clearance kicks by Coleman safely saw the match out.

Today's performance showed encouraging signs of progress by Stortford, but they will need to step up again for next week's visit by high-flying and, reportedly, high-paying Tonbridge Juddians.