Dings 27 Bournemouth 23

National Three South West
Dings Crusaders RFC
Saturday 8th October 2016
Dings 27 Bournemouth 23

A very one sided first half saw Dings leading at halftime 20-6 with three tries and opportunities for at least another three. However not for the first time this season they fell away in the second half to find themselves trailing 20-23 with just minutes on the clock and two men in the sin bin but their dogged spirit won the day as impressive lock Gavin Curry barged in under the posts to claim the win and try bonus point .

Right from the opening whistle Dings had the visitors on the back foot as they appeared to have no answer to the Dings aggressive midfield trio of Marcus Brooker, Sylvan Edwards and Matt Smith who continually bust the visitors defence but could not find the final pass.

Dings took the lead on twelve minutes when standoff Brooker barged through the visitors defence to put wing George Hooper over in the corner. Scrum half Steve Plummer added a penalty and visitors centre Gavin Hancox added two penalties to bring the score to 8-6 on twenty two minutes.

Dings second try went to centre Smith after full back Harry Tovey broke from his own twenty two and sprinted to the try line before offloading to Smith, Plummer added the conversion. Smith the scorer became the provider for Dings third try as he broke through the defence to feed Hooper for his second try and a halftime score 20-6 to Dings.

Dings continued to dominate in the opening ten minutes of the second half but failed to add to their score and a penalty from Hancox on fifty five minutes appeared to revitalise the visitors to produce their best spell of the match. Their first try came on sixty minutes with neat interplay between half backs Sam Hardcastle and Adam Davies putting wing Alex Everett-Bolter in for a try converted by Hancox.

Under pressure in their own twenty two Dings hooker Paul Fincken was yellow carded closely followed by Brooker and the visitors took immediate advantage with a try from wing Wyn Roberts converted by Hancox to lead for the first time in match on seventy one minutes.

Despite being reduced to thirteen men Ding responded magnificently with a series of drives deep into the visitors twenty two resulting in the winning try for Curry.

Scorers

Dings
Tries-Smith, Hooper 2, Curry
Pens-Plummer
Con- Plummer 2

Bournemouth
Tries-Everett-Bolter, Roberts
Pens- Hancox 3
Con- Hancox 2

Written by Richard Grant