1st XV Report - Sat 28th Feb 2009 v Ampthill

Wellingborough 13 - 52 Ampthill Following their first away win of the season last week, Wellingborough were looking to put in a good performance against league leaders Ampthill and they started this game with renewed confidence. In the early exchanges it looked far from a top v bottom contest and the visitors were forced into conceding a number of penalties.   Captain Peter Vickers stepped-up to the mark and was successful with his second attempt from long range to give Boro a 3-0 lead after five minutes.   The visiting pack was much larger and heavier than the home side and Boro's scrum was under pressure throughout the game; Kyle Danns dealt admirably with some very scrappy ball and after fifteen minutes, rescued the ball from the base of a twisting scrum and broke blind to release Steven Gall who, from his own 22 skipped around his opposite man and outpaced the cover defence to run the length and score under the posts, giving Vickers an easy conversion.   Boro maintained the pressure on the league leaders and despite struggling at the set piece, thanks to good running from Danns and an superb effort in defence from Jim Lovett and John Cartwright, competed well in the loose. Ampthill came back when from a scrum in Boro's 22, their No 8 made good yards and quick hands out wide saw their openside flanker touch down for a converted score.   Boro cam back immediately however, and good pressure in the line-out from Nick Murphy saw the visitors once again, penalised and Vickers slotted the three points to give Boro a 13-7 lead at the break.   With the visitors looking rocked at half time Ampthill showed why they are top of the league and with a couple of changes and a step-up in tempo, they took the game back to Boro in the second half, injuries to stand off Vickers and back row Andy Fordham didn't help Boro's cause and after five minutes, Ampthill started something of a procession which would eventually see them run out 13-52 victors.   All credit to Boro for sticking at the task and with prop Toby Johnson and flanker Cartwright needing stitches after the game, their walking wounded could attest to being in a very physical contest.   Director of Rugby Dudley Cross commented "For 40 minutes we showed that we can outplay the best that this league has to offer. All credit to Ampthill's second half performance; they showed why they are at the top. You can never be happy when you go down by 39 points however, with the players we've got I couldn't ask for any more effort, some of the guys tackled their socks off and we've shown that we can compete at this level".

 

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