Basingstoke on a roll!

Basingstoke 44 v Reading Abbey 15 at Pack Lane, Nov 12th 2005

BASINGSTOKE’S fourth consecutive South-West One league win was a day for the Simons, with all but one of ’Stoke’s scorers having the first name of Simon. The game started well for ’Stoke as poor discipline on the visitors’ behalf gave ’Stoke two easy penalties within 10 minutes, both kicked by Simon Humberstone. After another 10 minutes of solid pressure, Simon Crew finished off a good counter-attacking move and scored on his first start for the first XV. Humberstone converted and left the score at 13-0 to ’Stoke. At this stage, Abbey were showing little enterprise outside of their forwards, who earned a penalty and three points on 24 minutes. On 30 minutes, ’Stoke replied with a penalty of their own and, on 36 minutes, Simon Appleby chased a kick through following a well-worked backs move and scored to leave Humberstone a tricky conversion attempt. The kick was made and ’Stoke marched into a 23-3 lead.

After half-time, Reading had 10 minutes of possession and scored an unconverted try through non-stop pressure by the forwards. This was a wake-up call for the home side, who hit straight back when Humberstone converted his own try to take the score to 30-8. Ten minutes later, the final Simon, Simon Buckland, scored after a cross-field kick from Carl Marshall fell straight in his hands and a cool step allowed him to score under the posts. Humberstone took the score up to 37-8 with the conversion. Reading gained an unconverted try, which was answered in the final seconds with a try for Dave Lambert. Humberstone duly converted and the score stayed at 44-13 to ’Stoke. ’Stoke worked hard in the forwards to negate the Abbey pack, the visitors’ main strength, and looked very dangerous when they moved the ball wide. Man-of-the-match was scrum-half Jamie Fish, who just beat Humberstone, for the accolade. Simon Crew had a solid debut and October’s player-of-the-month Ross Stirling, usually blindside flanker, fitted in well at number 8, as Jim Dixon had to cover the withdrawal of Simon Lovegrove.

There was a discrepancy after the final whistle when the referee had the scoreline at 44-15, whereas all the others at the game had it as 44-13. The referee is the point of law so 44-15 was marked as the final score.

Player-coach Dixon said afterwards: "That was another good win, although we again only played well in patches. However, con- sidering our squad was stretched to the limits with injury and illness, that was pleasing. "This keeps the pressure on the sides above us and all I can ask is that we keep winning and scoring points."

’Stoke: Simon Humberstone, Dave Lambert, Simon Buckland, Matt Lucas, Gareth Jones, Carl Marshall, Jamie Fish (rep Darren Lillywhite); Mark Rushworth, Jim Dixon, Phil Perkins, Andy Wilson, Nate Mantle (rep Chris Williams), Simon Crew, Simon Appleby, Ross Stirling. Not used: Shane Murphy.

link to RFU site