Horsham advance to rugby county cup final

Unfortunately Uckfield were decimated by injuries and conceded the semi-final in advance, however credit must go to the East Sussex club for honouring the fixture.

The game was played as a friendly and to ensure that the game was competitive Horsham fielded a mixed 1sts/Lions team.

Horsham coach Nick Stocker stressed the good relationship between the two clubs “All credit to Uckfield. They are suffering an injury crisis and clearly their priority is the league, but the game was still played and they honoured the fixture in the good traditions of rugby.”

Jonny Ordidge opened the scoring following a surge by Dan Crook, and then Mike Penfold scored after a Nick Essex offload to make it 10-0 after 13 minutes.

Uckfield then pegged Horsham back with a penalty before Adam Day fielded a clearance to set up Matt Goodsir who ran hard at the defence, gathered his own chip under pressure and shrugged off an attempted tackle to score a stunning try, to make it 15-3 at half time.

A piece of quick thinking from Uckfield and some missed tackles from Horsham saw the gap narrow to 15-8, before Horsham added three further tries with Paul Talbot scoring from a powerful rolling maul, Essex coming in off his wing to slice through the centres to cross under the posts and then Matt Stone completed the try of the match after the ball had passed through several sets of hands following excellent support play. James Passfield added two conversions.

Stocker went on to say “It was a good opportunity for the whole coaching team to look at the Lions. Young prop Kyle Fairs had a great game on his debut, and there were strong performances from Mike Penfold and Adam Day. I also thought James Hatton looked good when he came on in the second row. In the backs I thought Doug Wright played well upon his return at scrum half and Nick Essex showed his speed on the wing.

The performances today give us much food for thought regarding selection for the big game next week.

It was a good day for the club all round with the 3rd Team winning 53-0 against Seaford 2nds to advance to the semi-finals of the Sussex Salver. “

Horsham next fixture is away to league leaders Thanet Wanderers on Saturday 25 January.

Horsham: Day (Talbot 40), Penfold, Fairs; Harman (capt), Green (Emson 40); Crook (Fisher 40), Pirt, Ordidge (Hatton 40); Wright (Stone 40), Price (Philip 40); O’Gorman, Henderson, Passfield, Essex; Goodsir