Hereford 22 Whitchurch 14
In ideal conditions for open rugby the Wyesiders added another home victory to their record.
The Hereford pack were dominant in the set pieces and they provided plenty of good ball for their backs to run in four tries, two in each half. If not for the occasional lapse in concentration they might well have doubled their total. Whitchurch were spirited opponents and capitalised on a couple of Hereford defensive errors to register two converted tries, one in each half.
A happy head coach, Scott Sturdy was pleased with the five-point win.
He said “It was our penultimate game at Wyeside before we play Stratford next week, we then have three games on the road to wind up our season. It was an emotional day for me, I was Coach at Whitchurch for several seasons and we may not get the opportunity to play each other again for a while, because of the league restructure. Today was not our best performance, Whitchurch were missing several of their star players which made for a bitty game, but we were pleased to take the five points.
It was pleasing to see Tom Williams put in a man of the match performance, Tom has trained all season and for personal reasons has not been able to play until today. The front row of Neil Clarke, Matt Frost and Nathan Boden all put in a good shift and it was great to see Bill Sparey back for his first game in quite a time. We look forward to welcoming Stratford next week and we would dearly like to sign off with a good win, which would see us finish the season with the reasonable return of ten home wins.
We would love to see you all come down to Wyeside to show your support, before we move to those last three away games.”
Hereford opened their account with a try in the fourth minute. A break by Richard Preece took play from their own half into Whitchurch territory, when his run was halted, the ball was moved wide to Jack Goodwin who drove through several tackles to touch down in the corner. Whitchurch responded when their kick to touch was handed by a Hereford player to a Whitchurch man, mistakenly thinking he was running up to take the lineout. The Whitchurch player proceeded to run into the Hereford goal area unimpeded to touch down.
Despite Hereford protests the referee awarded a try which was converted to give the visitors a narrow lead.
The Wyesiders regained the lead when they were awarded a penalty inside the visitors’ 22. They opted for a scrum and a break from the base of the scrum was driven to the line and Neil Clarke claimed the try, which was converted by Cal Brayshaw. Before the interval, a break by Tom Williams was laid off to Tom Ewins and moved through several pairs of hands before a knock-on frustrated the movement, just short of the goal-line.
Score at the interval remained at 12 points to 7.
Just four minutes into the second half a tap penalty set up a forward drive. Tom Williams broke away and laid off to Mark Philo who dived over for a try in the corner. The forward battle seemed to heat up a bit and a Whitchurch player was given 10 minutes in the bin to cool down. The Hereford pack was now dominating the set scrums and won a number of penalties. From one of which a passing movement was started, which moved from one side of the field to the other. The forwards set up a ruck which was driven over the goal line for Nathan Boden to touch down for the bonus point try.
Hereford’s Mark Philo was shown yellow for a late tackle and before the final whistle some casual Hereford defence allowed Whitchurch to end the game with a converted try, taking the score to 22 points to 14. The Hereford team was guilty of unforced errors in both defence and attack, which against better teams might well have proved fatal.
