Calne walked away from Cricklade on Saturday with another comfortable win to help push for the promotion that they deserve. From the kick off Calne showed that they wanted to play their normal fast, flowing game. No8 Alan Wicks caught the ball and burst up field like a rampaging bull, but the home side had other ideas slowing the play down however possible, which, if it were not for determination of Calne, it could have turned into a long afternoon.

Calne appear to have a bit of a trademark by giving away the first points and Saturday was no exception, conceding a penalty 4 minutes into the game. Which was duly converted giving Cricklade the start they wanted. This, as usual, woke Calne up and they started throwing the ball around with the confidence that you would expect to see at a much higher level.

Cricklade didn’t hold onto the lead for long thanks to the boot of Andrew Donegan converting two penalties within the next nine minutes, the second coming as a result from a great break from outside centre Guthrie Holliday. Going on previous form, Holliday cannot go a game without scoring, and Saturday was no exception, weaving his way past the defence to score a try that was converted.

Calne kept up the pressure with excellent performances from, Full Back, Stuart Boswell and, Blindside, Richard Kearney but with a concentration lapse gave away another penalty. This was slotted nicely between the posts. One more score was to come in the first half and that was from Damon Murphy who crossed the line after some good support work. Taking Calne into half time 12 points, the better after Donegan converted.

The second half was very much like the first with Calne winning all of their own set pieces and turning Cricklade over on most of theirs. The most dominating being the scrum from which the first score of the game from. No8 Wicks had to use all his skill to cope with the dominance of the front-five, made up of Matt Arnold, Max Whiston, Mick Dyer, Jim Morton and Neil Watkins. Using all their power to push the opposition scrum backwards at what you could a “gentle trot”, the ball was picked up at the base but the score disallowed for a controversial double movement. Calne then turned the next scrum over and after a single phase, Morten reached out to score his first try for the club.

Determined not to lie down Cricklade kept pushing at any opportunity and were awarded with another try shortly after, which looked to be a copycat of Calne’s disallowed try, all be it not from a Scrum. Jim Morten was then substituted for Matt Morten to complete the return of the brothers. After more domination Calne winger Seth Shardlow was on the end of a move from the back of a scrum to stroll over for another try for the youngster.

Cricklade’s final score was to come 10 minutes later with another unconverted try. The final score of the game came in injury time with Murphy ripping the ball from a maul and forcing his way over the line for his second of the game. Boswell was awarded the man of the match for his outstanding ball carrying.

Final Score. Cricklade 16 Calne 35

BACK