By Andy Burrows

Another good win from the 3^rd XV again this week and following on from the Whitstable result there were flashes of déjà vu again.  A couple of positional changes, and players moving up to the 2^nd XV this week, which led to this being a more structured side with more experience, and only a couple of whippets.

Well the game started off at such a blistering pace that mistakes started to happen, need to learn from this, but once the initial skirmishes from Ashford had been dealt with, Folkestone began to get into the game, and from one scrum in the opponents 22, Tash quickly broke away and passed to Stewart who scored in the corner, unconverted by Pritchard.  From then the Ashford pack had began to get the ball going forward and tried on numerous occasions to get through the defence in this game, but unlike last week, where the defence was inpenetrable, Ashford got through once, poor tackling was this cause (maybe 4 or 5 missed tackles), and they went on and scored, this was unconverted though.

A couple of changes had to be made throughout the second half through injury or fatigue (coming back after injuries), so on came McDonough, Roots and Linden during the half.  The second half started much like the first half, but with Folkestone now being on top in this match, but the dogged determined defence of Ashford started to waive, and from one such occasion Randall broke the line in his own 22, and ran and jinked his way to the opponents 22, and looked to offload and who was on his shoulder but the ever present Ballard (getting back to somewhere near his best form) who stormed over to score, unconverted even though this was near the posts, Ollie what happened!!  

The next twenty or so minutes were nick and tuck, and their full back had a storming game which kept them in the game, until a quick run and chip down the blindside by Tash, and a slight fumble by the full back, Tash quickly nipped in and kicked on, and picked up and dived over to score, again unconverted (kicking practice Wednesday!), this finished the game off.  This game was played in a really good spirit, which really helped the flow of the game (and the referee assisted in this), and this was an enjoyable match to play.

Team List:

Page J, Stewart, Ballard, Perry, Forbes, Silvey, Burrows, Randall, Smith K, Murray K, Jackson, Rogers, White, Knott, Smith P. Subs: Linden, Roots, McDonough