Bonus point win against powerful Anchorians

As a result, Anchorians were becoming something of a bogey side for Horsham, but with both sides having fallen out of the running for the two promotion places over recent weeks the pressure was off and Horsham’s young side including two debutants, Tom Johnson and Jerry Downey, made a fast start scoring three tries in the first half.

A delighted Horsham coach Nick Stocker said “I am very pleased with the performance which was perhaps our best of the season, especially the first 60 minutes, even with a number of key players missing. We played with great intensity, with good patterns to our play. Our defensive alignment and tackling was good. Our handling was safe, we were coming from depth and we were playing good 15 man rugby. We then allowed them back in before our players coming off the bench had settled.”

Jonny Whiting made a strong break following the kick-off then Gillingham came back with a penalty.

Horsham’s response was immediate and when awarded a penalty in front of the posts, Will Bell was directed to kick for touch. With the away supporters questioning whether this was the correct decision, in view of the failure to take advantage of this bold strategy in previous weeks, their fears were confounded when Horsham scored an excellent team try with good hands and great continuity which was finished off by James Whiting on 13 minutes.

With Anchorians having a player in the sin bin Horsham took advantage of the extra man four minutes later when Jonny Goward added a second try following good handing between forwards and backs.

Pressure at a scrum turnover lead to Gillingham straying offside and with the referee playing advantage Jonny Ordidge powered through the centre shrugging aside the attempted tackles of a couple of defenders to cross the line and edge ahead of the pack in the race to be the leading try scorer so far this season.

Anchorians responded by camping on Horsham’s line in the final minutes of the half but the Green and Whites held out with some resilient defence to go into half-time with a 15-3 lead.

Gillingham kicked the ball off the field on the full from the restart and from the ensuing scrum, following fine handling between forwards and backs, after going through multiple phases, Ryan Grover scored Horsham’s bonus point try.

With all conversion attempts having been missed the Green and Whites were not yet out of sight and as expected Anchorians were not about to give up and came back strongly. The ball was adjudged to have been held up from an attempted grounding off a Gillingham rolling maul, and then strong tackles were required from Tom Johnson and Bell to stem the opposition attacks followed by a try saving tackle from Jerry Downey.

Whiting picked up the ball from the back of the next scrum and made a break but when the pass was spilled, Anchorians kicked through and it required a long clearance to the half way line from Bell to ease the pressure.

Horsham then used their three bench replacements and Gillingham almost immediately scored a converted try. This was followed by another Gillingham break and only good tackling prevented a likely score.

With 13 minutes remaining Bell was yellow carded and when he returned James Whiting took his place in the sin bin. Spirited defence on the try line kept Anchorians at bay and time was running out but well into time added on Gillingham scored a converted try followed by the sound of the final whistle to a relieved Horsham contingent to celebrate their first win over Gillingham Anchorians for many years.

Stocker went on to say “The entire team played well and it was difficult to choose a man of the match which eventually went to birthday boy Scott Price. The front row of Paul Talbot and Giles Barber were exceptional against much larger opposition and Iain Fisher played well in his first game back for a long time. Jonny Goward continued his scoring streak and is the typical modern athletic second row. Jonny Ordidge scored an excellent try, Tom Johnson and Jerry Downey played well on their first team debuts and Kyle Fairs did well when he came on.

We systematically dismantled a good Gillingham side who never gave up as shown by the number of bonus points they have secured.”

Horsham’s next game is at home to Uckfield on Saturday April 5th.

Horsham: Talbot (capt), Fisher, Barber (Fairs 65); Grover, Goward (Green 62); Price, Smith (Pirt 68), Jonathan Whiting; Rush, Johnson; Downey, Ordidge, Taylor, Bell; James Whiting