Late penalty seals away win

Sandown travelled to Winchester hoping to get their season back on track with an away win. Although a few regulars light, skipper Martin McLaughlin assembled a strong team.

Kitted out in their new kit sponsored by club stalwart John Gillfillan, Sandown kicked against the elements in the first half and were immediately under pressure from their physical opponents.

Winchester scored early from a well worked set play. Sandown weathered the early pressure and their defence was excellent especially from the forwards. With Dave Steele, Adam Tyas and skipper Mclaughlin all putting in important tackles, but that didn’t stop Winchester from scoring another well worked try 10-0.

As the half wore on the travelling side spent more and more time in the Winchester half. With scrum half Michael Booth prompting the attacks, Sandown went close first through Josh Wetherick and then through Tony Lillington.

Winchester only looked dangerous when Sandown conceded easy possession to them. Sandown eventually got on the score sheet when the excellent Mark Waterer broke and fed outside centre Stephen Perfect who crashed through a number of tackles and, with the home defence on the back foot, he popped the ball off to the supporting Lawrence Edmonston who raced over to touch down in the corner. Half time 10-5 to the home side.

The second half started badly for the Hurricanes as Winchester again scored early to make the score 17-5, but this spurred Sandown on and with the elements in their favour they pushed forward on a number of occasions.

Sandown got themselves back in touch when, from a Winchester attack, the superb Stephen Perfect intercepted a hopeful pass to race the length of the field to touch down under the posts and with Edmonston converting this made the score 17-12.

The rest of the match saw the visitors trying to get the ball wide to use their superior pace and the home side running the ball with strong runners around the fringes, but with the superb back row of Josh Wetherick, Chris Perfect and WIGHTLINK man of the match Arthur Buxton all tackling and stopping the hard runners in their tracks it was only a matter of time before they scored again.

This came when BIG JOHN man of the match Michael Booth moved the ball to Edmonston who then released Waterer and he skipped past the home sides tacklers to tie the scores.

This left twenty minutes and most of this was spent with Sandown attacking through the hard running Steele, Steve Perfect and debutant John Smith.

The breakthrough came when Winchester infringed just outside their twenty two, this allowed Edmonston to stroke a penalty over to put the jubilant visitors in front for the first time.

The last ten minutes was a backs to the wall effort with Sandown's strong tackling cancelling out the hard running Winchester forwards and when wing Steve Johnson stopped his opposite number in his tracks the referee blew the final whistle to bring a close entertaining game to an end.

TEAM: Steele, Tyas, McLaughlin, S Perfect, Smith, Buxton, Wetherick, C Perfect, M Booth, Edmonston, Lillington, S Perfect (Jnr), Waterer, Johnson, Borrer, Swallow

Tries – Lawrence Edmonston, Stephen Perfect (Jnr), Mark Waterer.
Pen – Lawrence Edmonston 1
Conv – Lawrence Edmonston 1