Last season we were put to the sword by Streatham & Croydon, conceding over 40 points in little more than a half and with the game finishing very early. So this year we were after revenge and knew we had a stronger team, albeit there was still some trepidation when we saw the size of many of their boys and we knew that if we let them run at us we would be in trouble, as we had been a year before.

And so it seemed to be when they scored a soft try straight from the kick off, with one player running through numerous attempted tackles. 0-5 within 1 minute was ominous. However, we then settled, we took a scrum against the head, Jamie picked up at No.8 and made good ground before passing to the supporting Jed who forced his way over for a try. 5-5. We then won another scrum against the head and took a quick penalty but were held up just short. We won another penalty though and from this Sam Evans made a strong run before timing a great pass to Jed, who was in support and scored again. 10-5.

We then missed a lot of tackles and let them back into the game when they ran in a try straight from a penalty, although it must be said that some of their boys were so powerful that they were hard to tackle and possessing some big hand offs. They converted this try so went 10-12 ahead. And soon after we lost the ball when in a promising attacking position and they cantered away to score a break out try. 10-19 down and looking a bit ominous.

But back we came and after we pressurised their scrum James Blain tackled their scrum half and popped the loose ball up to Jamie who ran a good line to score. 15-19. We then brought our secret weapon onto the pitch (Ryan) who scored a really good try down the left hand side, picking up a pass off his toes, breaking a tackle and then showing the defence a clean pair of heels to score. So we went into the half time break just ahead at 20-19. In the first half we had looked much the better rugby team, playing some nice rugby but allowing their strong runners to break through too easily.

After the break a promising attack fizzled out after a knock on and a rather familiar theme re-occurred, with lots of missed tackles allowing them to score. At 20-24 we were behind again and their No.8 was doing lots of damage with his bullocking runs, with only desperate defence from Sam and Jed eventually bringing him down after one attack. We were then awarded a penalty on our 22 and quick thinking from James Bacon saw us attack quickly down the right hand side where they had little cover, with a try under the posts following after great support play from first Jamie and then Jed, who cantered over for his third of the match. We were 27-24 ahead with the conversion.

We then won a good line out and some really good handling saw the ball passed down the line quickly and out to Ryan who again demonstrated amazing speed to whizz down the left wing from our 10m line and score. We were 32-24 up, so two scores ahead, but definitely didn't feel safe.

From the kick off we had a line out where loose ball got tapped back and we were pushed back into our 22. We ran the ball out well from our scrum but when we conceded possession their No.8 once again punished us a powerful run and soon they scored from a scrum on half way, with their centre simply beating us for pace on the outside. 32-29 with a few minutes to go and it was a very nervy time with them winning ball and looking dangerous. Jamie made another great run from the back of a scrum but we lost the ruck after too many players simply leaned instead of clearing out and they then counter attacked. Fortunately they knocked on the ball in one attack and their last one was stopped with a great covering tackle, leading to the final whistle. We had won, just, by 32-29.

Overall this was a great team performance, with all the boys showing real courage to come back from behind on several occasions and to hold on at the very end, but there were also several stand out individual performances with Sam Evans, Jed Stilling, Jamie Hughes, James Bacon, Daniel Willicombe and George Watchhorn all playing the full match and making huge contributions. Ryan also scored two tries on his debut and added some much needed pace to the team, but Man of the Match goes to Jed for his work in defence and a hat trick of tries, just reward for great support play.

Finally, thank you to Jack, Connor and Andrew for playing one half for the opposition to make a fair game of it - all in the spirit of fair play!