Fakenham 86 - 0 Woodbridge 05.03.22 London 3 Eastern Counties

The seventeenth and penultimate round of London 3 Eastern Counties fixtures saw Fakenham host Woodbridge at the Stringer Ground. Earlier in the season Fakenham ran out 29 – 7 winners at Woodbridge in a game played out under Storm Arwen.

With a pre-match luncheon sponsored by AOT Engineering, there was a good crowd to watch the game despite the grey skies and drizzle, as Fakenham looked to repeat the result from earlier in the season.

Fakenham started the game well, with winger Josh Gee carrying strongly into contact to provide some forward momentum. It wasn’t long before they managed to cross the whitewash, with some good hands from the backs giving outside centre Ashley Stewart room out wide, before he was able to run it in closer to the posts. This made the conversion for full back Murray Tindal a more straight forward proposition and he duly kicked the two points.

The rest of the first half followed a similar pattern, with a strong platform set by the Fakenham forwards allowing the backs to run in another five tries before half time. Perhaps the pick of the bunch was Tindal taking the ball in space just inside his own half, before showing impressive pace to run across the pitch and outside the final defender to touch down.

Another of the tries was set up again by the forwards as hooker Rory Singleton carried the ball before off loading out of the tackle on the half way line to put flanker and captain James Howell in for a run to the corner. Whilst he looked set to score, Howell inexplicably stepped back inside and took contact halfway into the Woodbridge 22. However, after retaining and recycling the ball, Fakenham went over a few phases later. With three of the five tries converted, the half time score was 38 – 0.

Fakenham continued to play good attacking rugby in the second half, showing impressive ball handling skills to keep the ball alive and move the point of attack throughout. There was parity at the lineout, as both sides were able to win their own ball without disrupting the opposition. Woodbridge did take control of the scrums as the second half wore on, showing good strength to drive Fakenham back and win a scrum or two against the head.

However, Fakenham continued to show purpose with ball in hand and scored another eight tries in the second half, with five more conversions from Tindal. For one of the tries, an impressive counter ruck from Fakenham on the Woodbridge 5 metre line saw the Woodridge players driven back over their own try line and the ball bounce loose in the in-goal area, with flanker Patrick Lound reacting quickest to get downward pressure on the ball with one hand to score the try.

Another notable score saw Woodbridge clear their lines from their own 22 only so far as Fakenham winger Josh Gee, who volleyed the ball forwards, chased it forwards and picked it up to dot down unopposed over the line.

The final score was 86 – 0, a great result for Fakenham. Woodridge showed good fight throughout and did well to field a team despite Covid thinning their ranks.

The Barsham Brewery Man of the Match was second row Adam Lingwood, who carried strongly and tackled well throughout, as well as offering a good link between forwards and backs at times.

Next week sees Fakenham 1st XV travel to Thurston for the final league game of the season. Fakenham ran out 12 – 7 winners at the Stringer Ground in the first game of the season, but Thurston have had a better season since, sitting fourth in the league.

There is a bus travelling to Thurston from the Stringer Ground, so if you want to come along and support the boys as they look to finish the league with a win, please get in touch.