Match Preview

Remember, remember the fifth of November… Entertainment, beers and rugby!
We’re back at Raleigh Park this weekend for the first of two consecutive home games, starting off by welcoming Devonport Services IIs to our place.

Going into tomorrow’s game, the boys will look to make the most of each opportunity after last week’s close defeat away at Torquay. Tries from Vinnie Neath-Rogers, Chris Gibbons and Mike Richards with five additional points by Harry Symons hoped to be enough, but two scores from the home side inside the final ten minutes meant that the boys had to settle for the losing bonus point on the road in South Devon. A disappointing loss, however, a vast improvement from the same fixture last season which shows we’re heading in the right direction!
This result last week saw us drop a couple of places down to fifth in the table, however with the league so tight at the top, a win this week could see us back up again…

Our visitors currently sit tenth in the table. A rocky start from the Plymouth-based side has now been corrected and have now won two games on the trot, most recently a dominant 42-5 victory against Exmouth II last weekend at The Rectory.

It will be the first meeting between our two sides for many years. We last faced Devonport’s 1st XV way back when both sides played in the old Western Counties league, we have never played their 2nd XV, but based on previous meetings in general, we can expect a tough, physical game and will need to be on form in all areas of the pitch.

With minimal changes to the Withy starting XV over the past few weeks, consistency is proving, on the whole, to work well for the boys in green and black so with another exciting encounter and testing challenge ahead of us this weekend, there’s only one place to be… Raleigh Park!!

We kick off at 2:30pm, but as ever the clubhouse and bar will be open from 12:30pm – see you then!