SEVENOAKS IV 17, MAIDSTONE IV 10.  

October 14th.

The game at Knole Paddock started with an excellent opening from Stones, with Parker and Hayton combining well to break open the midfield for Hayton to go over in the corner, resulting in an unconverted try. Stones then set up a perfectly
executed restart and cleared the ball to touch resulting in a 7oaks lineout.
Some excellent pressure from Simon Wright allowed David Scanlan to steal the ball and link with Angus Parker to release the backs for a swift and clinical counter attack which resulted in a Stones try by out-side centre Ben Mckellar.

After a superb opening quarter of an hour the game began to fragment and 7Oaks  began to gain the upper hand, with their open-side flanker living on the edge and spoiling most of  Maidstone’s  possession.
Owing to a lack of co-ordination in the set piece and some very dubious refereeing decisions especially in the tackle situations, Stones conceded three penalties with only one being converted. Then with Stones firmly on the back foot, 7Oaks broke through the hardened defence to score a  converted try and bring the score to 10-10.

The second half began with an excellent move down the left side with Ben Jones instrumental in triggering the move through many sets of hands and an excellent give and draw by Simon Wright allowed French winger, Nicholas Morand to break open down the wing and cut inside, only to be stopped by an excellent last ditch tackle by the opposing scrum half. Then came another dubious decision by the referee, a penalty against Stones.   With this the screw was turned by 7Oaks and a lost lineout allowed Marcus Carling, the 7 Oaks inside centre, who had been a real threat from the start, to clinch the match with a converted try.

It was lucky that Maidstone had such a strong team out on the day because, against a 7Oaks team that has played 4-5 seasons together, they could have lost by a cricket score.  As it was, Maidstone gained two League points for finishing less than 10 points behind and can look forward to the re-match at home.