Off to a great start

Rochford Hundred Harts put down their first league win of the season in a hard fought game with Romford at Magnolia Road. With a mix of new and young players to add to the senior squad this season there was some exciting and entertaining rugby played between two sides that weren’t afraid to experiment with some open running rugby.

A powerful and hard hitting Romford side started the better and opened the scoring, a knock on by Rochford allowed Romford to put their big forwards to work and some excellent hands by the Romford backline exposed the space out wide for them to crash over the line within the opening minutes of the contest, and this was easily converted by the excellent Romford goal kicker 0-7.

This served as a wake up call for the boys from Rochford who began to pick up the pace of the game and expose Romford all over the park. Some forceful running from the likes of Bacon, Knowles and Murphy pushed Rochford deep into the Romford half and just yards from the line, the returning Scrum Half, Forbes played the ball quickly for the backs to attack who were again held back from scoring by the excellent Romford defence until O’Benny got his hands on the ball from the resulting ruck and dove over the line to record Rochford’s first try of the day, which was converted by debutant Dolman, 7-7.

Rochford now began to take control of the game playing with pace and strength, the front row of young Rob Cook, Bolden and Atkins began to take control of the scrum against a much larger Romford pack and Rochford were starting to play some impressive rugby. The next score came from a quick line out orchestrated by fly half and former captain Head who burst down the wing evading a couple of tackles on the way who eventually fed the ball to the impressive Scott Gledhill who went over the line to open his account for the season, which was once again converted by Dolman, 14-7.

This was quickly followed up by another Gledhill try coming once again from some powerful running by the Rochford eight, recycled quickly and span out wide for Gledhill to crash over for his second of the day, 19-7. Romford however were not about to lie down and came back into the game with some impressive rugby of their own, the Romford Fly half was constantly causing problems for the Rochford backline and eventually Romford broke down the blindside and drove over the line for their second score of the day.

Half time Rochford 19-12 Romford

The second half continued in the same vain as the first with both sides playing some excellent rugby however Rochford were the more powerful and turned over a number of rucks in midfield to set the backs off once again running deep into the Romford half and causing problems. After a number of enforced changes for both sides the game settled down again into its usual pattern and the Rochford number Eight Churton made an aggressive run deep into the Romford half which was once again quickly recycled and an overlap was created out on the left wing for Bowen to bag his first try of the season, 24-12.

Never a team to lay down Romford had the last say of the game as they went over in the corner in the last play of the game to peg them back to within 5 points but unfortunately for them they were playing on with borrowed time and the ref eventually blew the final whistle to end the game with a Rochford win 24-19.