Bishop's Stortford 1st XV 38 Guernsey 20

Despite arriving late, Guernsey made the stronger start off their truncated warm-up than Stortford, whose routine was in turn disrupted by a 15 minute delay to the kick-off time. Within 3 minutes, the visitors took the lead with a smart try by their left wing after a good break by their fullback from a poor kick out of defence by Stortford was compounded by a missed tackle. The home side surged back onto the attack and forced a number of penalties in quick succesion, resulting in a yellow card for their No 8 and skipper after only 5 minutes of the game. Buoyed by a very strong tight scrum, Guernsey defended stoutly and, despite being reduced to 13 men by a yellow card to their inside centre only 4 minutes later after further penalty offences, they held out until the 14th minute. At this point winger, Wayne Child touched down out wide from a well judged grubber kick crossfield by John Stocker. The conversion from out wide was missed leaving the scores tied and the deadlock wasn't broken until 22 minutes into the game, when Marcus Cattell glided diagonally through a gap in the back-pedalling Guernsey defence to touch down close to the posts. This was due reward for e spell of patient rugby going through the phases off a position created by a crash ball taken up the middle by the centre himself. Tom Coleman made no mistake with the conversion to take his side out to a 12-5 lead. The next score, though went to the visitors after 36 minutes, when 2 passes from another powerful scrum in the Stortford 22 were enough to see Guernsey's 12 score a try under the posts. Stocker then made another telling contribution, charging down the conversion attempt to leave his side in a narrow lead. Stortford bounced back onto the attack and some more patient buildup work stretched the visitors' defence, such that 2 long passes were all it took to give Sam Winter room to round the last defender and touch down under the posts after 39 minutes. Coleman's conversion took the score at halftime to 19-10.

Stortford started the second period very strongly and tries after 2, 8 and 11 minutes of the half by Jono Child, Adam Gelman and Child again, the last 2 converted by Coleman took the home side out to a 38-10 lead. Stocker, Winter and Cattell all made significant contributions in the buildup to the scores and Guernsey seemed, understandably to be rocking on their heels at this stage. Showing tremendous grit and determinatuion, however, the visitors stormed back onto the offensive and, assisted by a hint of relaxation from Stortford they came back strongly into the game. Under pressure now, the home side didn't help their cause by incurring two yellow cards of their own after 23 minutes (Sean Edwards for a breakdown offence) and 32 minutes (Hugh Michell for interfering with a player off the ball). In between these two incidents, Guernsey scored an unconverted try through their 12, crashing over through a tackle off the back of a well-drilled 5 metre lineout. The visitors were then extremely quick to capitalise on the reduction of the opposition to 13 men, scoring their own bonus point try out wide through their 5, as they clinically stretched the home defence after 34 minutes. This proved to be the last score of the match and the home side were happy to settle for a good win over a very competetive opposition and with no significant new injuries.

Barnes' loss at Tonbridge Juddians means that Stortford have replaced the former side in second place, 2 points ahead of their rivals, to whom we have to travel next week. This has all the makings of a real crunch game and the team will surely find themselves backed by strong travelling support for this big encounter.