Bishop's Stortford 1st XV 23 London Irish Amateurs 13

The visitors took an early lead with a penalty goal, after Stortford had failed to secure the ball from the opening dropout and Irish maintained possession to eventually force an offence at a breakdown, some 5 minutes into the game. It didn't take long, however for Stortford to take the lead, when John Stocker took an inside pass from Tom Coleman to break the initial defensive line and then shimmy his way past two defenders to touch down close to the posts. Coleman duly converted to take the score to 7-3. Only 11 minutes into the game, Stortford appeared to have taken control with a try by prop, James Zhao out wide on the right, rounding off some excellent interplay between backs and forwards, in which Sam Winter, Mark McCraith and Damien Sangster were prominent. The touchline conversion into the wind proved too difficult for Coleman. The resilient visitors fought back with another penalty goal after 18 minutes following another breakdown offence by Stortford to take the score to 12-6. Stortford then spurned a golden opportunity for another try, following another tremendous move, with the ball passing through many pairs of hands, but, when an insdide pass would have guaranteed a score under the posts, white line fever took over and another good Irish tackle out wide forced a knock-on. The final score of the half, in fact went the visitors' way when, having struggled once more to retain ball at a Stortford scrum in its own 22, the side managed, somehow to turn the ball over and three or four passes were all that was required to see the Irish over for a try close to the posts after 35 minutes. The routine conversion took the halftime score to 12-13.

Stortford started the second half much better than the first, as Mark McCraith seized on the loose ball, as Irish failed to gather the opening kick-off and a brief period of pressure in the visitors' 22 was sufficient to force a penalty at a breakdown, which Coleman converted to restore the home lead. Eight minutes into the half and another Coleman penalty extended the Stortford lead to 18-13, as Irish were penalised for the second time, as the home side went through a number of phases. The visitors passed up an opportunity to narrow the gap when, after 20 minutes, they missed an eminently kickable penalty, when the home side was adjudged, rather harshly to have committed a high tackle. The long-threatening rain then descended in monsoon proportions on Silver Leys, with the wind simultaneously turning into Stortford's faces, but this seemed only to sting the home side into greater concentration, as they ran through more phases of both forward drives and handling through the backs, than they had managed to put together all game. As a result of this impreesive handling, the stubborn Irish defence was eventually stretched sufficiently for Stortford winger, Nick Harris to be given enough room to run in a try out wide from some 30 metres. Coleman's very difficult conversion attempt into the wind fell just short. Despite more forceful play by the Irish forwards at both scrum and in the loose, Stortford's defence held firm for the remaining quarter of an hour and, aided by a number of knock-ons by the visitors' backs in the increasingly unpleasant conditions managed to hold out relatively comfortably to the 23-13 scoreline.

Today's performance, albeit in difficult playing conditions, was undoubtedly partly due to rustinees after two weeks without matches and only one outdoor training session. The whole side will undoubtedly have benefitted from such a hard game against determined opposition and will be looking forward to next week's rearranged game at Bracknell - hopefully, with better weather!