Guernsey 0 Bishop's Stortford 1st XV 59

Showing considerable patience and some excellent judgement of options, Stortford started the game with a bang, the pack, in particular going through phase after phase of powerful, driving rugby to create room for the backs, who were back to the kind of form displayed in the second half of last season. This produced kickable penalties for offences at the breakdown by a stretched home defence after 2 and 6 minutes, both of which were converted by flyhalf, Tom Coleman. Tries had to come, though, as Stortford maintained the flow of 15-man rugby, running some of the steam out of Guernsey’s larger pack. The first 5-pointer went to centre, John Stocker 15 minutes into the game, taking a flat pass from Coleman on the opposition 22 to crash through the first tackle and side-step the fullback to give his standoff an easy conversion. Undaunted, the home pack launched a number of driving mauls of their own to test the visitors’ defence with their line under threat. Resistance was solid, however and, Stortford took advantage of a home knock-on to resume their own driving forward play to eventually force a penalty in the Guernsey half, when the home No 7 was yellow-carded for preventing the release of the ball at a breakdown after 28 minutes. The visitors ruthlessly exploited their extra man by kicking the penalty for touch close to the 5 metre line and, from the resultant lineout, driving prop, Will Freeston over for another try, which Coleman this time just failed to convert. Further impressive interplay between forwards and backs saw pressure again being exerted on the Guernsey line and a clinical grubber kick by Coleman saw Stocker gather the ball and slide over for his second try on 35 minutes. An excellent touchline conversion took the score to 0-25. Coleman continued to pull the strings to good effect and a well-judged, short switch-pass to Wayne Child saw the winger burst through the centre of the field to force another penalty under the home posts for failing to release at the tackle. The flyhalf had no problem in adding the three points to his own and the team’s tally 39 minutes into the game. The scoring for the half was concluded some 3 minutes later, when Stocker scored his hat-trick and Stortford’s bonus point try, after a lineout steal and a break off the back of a resultant maul by Gill found good support from scrumhalf, Sam Coleman, his brother, Tom and Wayne Child. The conversion was missed to leave the score at halftime at 0-33.

Guernsey, now having the benefit of the breeze started the second period vigorously, but Stortford remained largely in control until, after 10 minutes their prop, Sean Edwards was yellow-carded on the home team’s 22 for failing to release immediately a tackled player. This, inevitably led to some Guernsey pressure, including taking a scrum against the head, but some more excellent tackling by the visitors prevented the concession of any points. It took some time, nevertheless for the visitors to get their attacking game going again and it was not until the 24th minute that the next try was scored after a Guernsey backrow player was cleanly stripped of the ball, trying to break out off the back of a scrum in their own 22 and one quick pass was sufficient to set returning winger, Nick Harris clear to dive in at the corner. An impressive conversion by Coleman took the score to 0-40. Five minutes later and it was the flyhalf’s turn to touch down in the same corner, running in from some 30 yards off a long pass from fullback, Sam Winter, as he ran back a Guernsey kick. This time the conversion went wide. Harris scored his second try 34 minutes into the half following some more impressive interplay between forwards and backs, with Stocker and substitute centre, Marcus Cattell playing key roles. Coleman converted from under the posts to take the score to 0-52. In a final flourish, after the referee had called the last play of the game, Winter ran back another kick out of Guernsey’s defence, finding great support from Wayne Child and second row, Hamish Irving, the latter scything his way over the try-line under the posts from some 20 metres out. Coleman’s conversion took the score to 0-59.

If Stortford can show the same patience, teamwork and picking of options next week, we can look forward to a potentially titanic battle with second-placed Barnes at Silver Leys in front of a large crowd of former players, whose annual lunch takes place before the game. Anyone who hasn’t yet booked their place for the lunch should contact Jan Zelezinski quickly on 07753 931569 or email Znaj1951@yahoo.com.