Pitchero

Pegasus Palmerians

Witham

, , ,

Tries

C Gibson (2), d chesson, Unknown

Conversions

Unknown (3)

Penalties

la 2 helmi 14:00 - The Shepherd Neame Essex Merit Table - Division 3 Full time

Report

Highlights

Selection

Inches from victory

By John Cox

A truly brave fightback from Witham brought us a last gasp chance that the breeze took away.

It was a cold blustery day but Pegasus started brightly with crisp handling and deep running to push Witham back. No nonsense tackling became a theme of the day but the hosts were relentless and having made space on the wing, they used it to open the scoring. Not long after, they were over again, having switched the play and found spaces in the defence. Witham had seen little possession, but when they did have the ball, the Phelps-Knight brothers were used to make yards before releasing the backs. Charlie Gibson was proving elusive for the Pegasus defenders and skipped through for a great individual try. Josh Phelps-Knight slotted the conversion. Pegasus attacked from the restart and although Witham kept them at bay for quite some time, they did add to their score with a try. As the half came to a close, Gibson sent a pinpoint kick to the corner. Luke Standbridge stole the lineout ball he set up an attack. With Ryan Logue stopped short of the line, Daz Chesson dummies the obvious pass to Gibson and darted over to score. With Josh Phelps-Knight getting the conversion, the half time score was 17-14.
Witham were encouraged by how close the scores were and started the second half on a mission. A clever loop move created space and once again Gibson escaped to score a try that, along with the conversion, gave Witham the lead by 17-21. The Pegasus backs were still full off running while their forwards were tiring. A couple of deep kicks gave them territory from which they retook the lead through their blind side winger. They also added a penalty to establish a 27-21 lead. In the last minute, Witham had a scrum 10 meters out. The pack were so dominant, a penalty was awarded, now only 5 meters away. This time the pack drove over the line for George to ground the ball. The conversion was tricky but Josh Phelps-Knight had the chance to win the game. Annoyingly, the breeze helped the ball drift just wide. The score probably does reflect the game but the effort put in by Witham players would have justified stealing the win. Spectators choice for man of the match was Marley Valentine who just seemed to be everywhere we needed him and made every tackle he went for.