19 March 2006
A strong and bitterly cold wind made handling and kicking conditions difficult, and somewhat spoiled a good contest.
Despite the advantage of playing downwind in the first half, Medway struggled to make an impression on the strong home defence. Then an attempt by Wells to run the ball from their 22 was punished as the alert and spring-heeled Jamie Chapman intercepted a rushed pass and ran in unchallenged.
Medway had the majority of possession and territory in the rest of the half and their was some anxiety on the touchline that their advantage was being wasted, but 5 minutes veofre half-time they doubled their lead. Picking the ball from the base of a scrum, number 8 Gavin Hyder ran at the defence and offloaded to Stewart Stockford. A quick shimmy fooled the defence for once, and he ran in under the posts.
Medway expected a tough second half into the wind, yet they more than held their own. Three minutes after the restart, Richard Verrall took a pass from Hyder on half-way and and puthis head down. Caught five metres from the line, he used his strength to stay on his feet and pushed over the line with the help of Chapman.
Wells went further behind after rtying to break from a period of Medway pressure, but the ball went loose out of a tackle. Jonathan Saddington plucked it from the boot of the Wells runner and swerved and sidestepped his way through three tackles to reach the goal line. Hyder converted and Medway had 22 points on the board.
Wells now put some pressure on of their own. From a Medway drop-out, fullback and wing combined to run round the Medway defence and under the posts for a converted try.
There were ten minutes left and Wells tried hard to maintain their momentum,
but the Medway defence stayed strong and eventually came away with a satisfying
win.
