Nathan Taylor denied the visitors a comeback victory as he scored all four tries for Cinderford in an epic battle against Bishop’s Stortford.
With the conditions in their favour the home team dominated in the first half, winning multiple scrum penalties for consistently driving Stortford metres backwards. All the Cindy tries in the first half were identical to one another, as in true Cinderford style, three driving mauls from line outs led to Taylor keeping control at the back and finding his way over the line. Mike Austin converted two out of three.
Stortford did however manage to squeeze one try into the first half as they found themselves with a scrum under the posts, they quickly sent the ball out to Joshua Stannard who took a dive to the line. Lloyd missed the conversion, however his successful penalty kick earlier in the half meant that the half time score was 19-8.
Cinderford appeared to lose their spark in the second half as Stortford stepped up a gear in attack. The visitors scored a terrific try as quick hands to the wing drew the home defence in leaving space for Jake Morris to sprint to the line. Lloyd added the extras. After multiple phases just short of their try line Alex Rayment grasped another five points for Stortford as he dodged the Cinderford defence, which was comfortably converted by Powell to put the visitors 22-19 ahead.
Tensions were at a high during the last 10 minutes as Cinderford made it back into their attacking half. Eventually after a long hard fight against a strong Stortford defence, Cindy stuck to what they know best and kicked a penalty into the corner for the line out, which allowed Taylor to score the winning try out the back of a maul.
Cinderford; Morgan Adderly-Jones, Mason Tonks, Will Baldwin, George Boulton, Will Gilderson, Mike Wilcox, Mike Austin, George Porter, Nathan Taylor, Shaun Knight, Tyler Jerrum, Jack Shields, Matt Lane, Joe Mullis, Harry Hone (Capt.)
Repls; Alex Chalkin, Tim Brockett, Dan Hodge, George Angell, Jimmy Williams.