ALL BLACKS OUT FOXED BY STRONG RUNNING BICESTER SIDE

Gosford had barely touched the ball when the rampant BIcester side scored in the opening minute of the match through Tom Miles who converted his own try to put the visitors in the driving seat. Within 5minutes of the restart the alert Bicester 10 and skipper Dave Hampton placed a neat kick behind the Gosford defence and quickly pounced on the follow up to score near the posts. Tom Miles converted (0-14). This poor start shook the hosts who very gradually started to pull things together although they were being dominated in the set pieces and had to live off scraps of possession in the loose. Another Bicester attack saw full back Charlie Bethell lingering out on the left wing and he snapped up an enormous pass with Gosford trying to defend a two man overlap and Bethell had the space to comfortably score an unconverted try (0-19). Then followed a period of spirited Gosford play with scrum half Joe Ballinger beavering away at the rucks and scrums and providing fly half Harry Sutton with a reasonable service. The latter made a number of weaving runs to worry the "Foxes" back line but through inconsistency the passes he provided to others did not reach their full potential. The visitors scrum half Christian Mann scrambled over to score on 35minutes with Tom Miles adding the extras (0-26) The home side went into the interval boosted by a well-engineered try with Harry Sutton launching a superb pass to the bustling winger Jack Briggs who burst through the cover from the 22 metre line to score wide out. Tim Ellis slotted the extras with excellent conversion. (7-26)

Bicester continued their scoring spree when lock Dan Spencer was driven over the whitewash and Tom Miles kicked the conversion(7-33) All Blacks Head Coach Matt Watts brought on tight head prop Chris Lloyd for Myles Selvey and Tom Heydon went in to hook with No 8 Liam Beesley ( who had a forceful game) moving into lock to replace Richard Tyler and Joe PIgott coming into the back row. The set scrums seemed to improve at this juncture and provided a more solid platform for Joe Ballinger to work with but the amount of missed tackles in the loose allowed BIcester lock Will Thurlow to romp through to score an easy try.Tom Miles added the extras. (7-40) Further poor defending by the home side let in Charlie Bethell for his second try which Tom Miles converted. (7-47) Gosford suffered the wrath of visiting Gloucestershire Society Tom Falkingham who had good control over the game and centre Miles Johnson was sin binned on 65minutes to deplete the Gosford side. Bicester took their chances to increase their score as centre Adam White scored with Tom Miles converting. (7-54) The final score saw Charlie Bethell nip in to score his third try which was unconverted try with minutes remaining and notch up a final result of:

GOSFORD ALL BLACKS RFC 7 -v- BICESTER RFC 59

Gosford Man of the Match :Scrum half Joe Ballinger got through a great deal of intelligent work behind a beaten scrum.

Forward of the day: Lock Luke Burbidge - his tackling was fearless and positive.

Player of Special Mention: No 8 Liam Beesley strong woork rate although carrying an injury.

Mike Rhymes

GABRFC UPB.