Vale Round of Season in Style

Although 7 of the tries were claimed by backs, Avonvale's forwards shared the credit as they contained, and eventually overcame a far more experienced home pack.

Full back Chris Cooper made the opening try though, collecting a poor attempted clearance kick and weaving between oncoming defenders before delivering the try scoring pass to centre Joe Vowles who added to conversion to take a lead the the Bathford side would never give up.

Chippenham did respond, using their forward strength to make ground and finding enough space in the Vale defence to cross the line.

Vale struck again from the restart, their forwards turning over the ball and feeding the backs and a solo effort from centre Steve Grant took him to within a few metres from the line but a couple of well struck kicks took the ball across and he followed to touch down.

Again Chippenham responded, again using their forwards and the pressure led to their second and the gap was closed to 2 points once more.

Vale though took no time at all to reassert themselves, wing Tom Hendy almost emulating Grant but the defence managed to hack the ball into touch. The well taken line out gave Vale clean ball which again went quickly to the backs. Grant this time chipping over the defenders and Cooper was on hand to gather and score.

This time the home side had no reply and Vale attacked again, a well won scrummage giving scrum half Sam McGhee the opportunity to slice between the staggered defence and dive between the uprights, the Vowles conversion proving to be the last play of the half.

With a number of replacements made at the interval it was Chippenham who settled first and another set of forward manoeuvres saw them break through the travelling defence once more but for the last time. Vale then took total control, scoring straight from the restart, again the forwards winning the ball and a clever pass to Cooper, now on the wing, gave him room to sweep around the outside and score.

A failed restart then gave the visitors a scrum in the centre and another enterprising gallop from Grant saw him bag his second.

With the home forwards now tiring, Vale went for a pushover try but the deliberate collapse resulted in the referee awarding a penalty try instead. Vowles added the extras and did so again with the final kick of the game, this time following his own second touch down after Vale had again turned good forward play into points for their backs.

Despite a few poor performances, coach Andrew ‘Tank’ Ball was delighted with the third place finish, saying “with so many young players, this has been a season to be proud of and gives even more hope of future success”.