Home Side's Indiscipline Gifts Win to Dons
Rugby Result: Regional 1 South Central - Havant 11 - Wimbledon 16
Picture: Wimbledon RFC/Facebook
This was always going to be a close match, the best defence in the league (Havant) playing at home on their artificial pitch against the best attack in the league (Wimbledon) playing away from home.
The outcome was that attack won by two tries to one with the home team not doing themselves any favours by upsetting the referee Mr Carey of the Bristol Society to award them with three yellow cards during the match. Playing with fourteen men for nearly thirty minutes allowed Wimbledon’s scrum to get on top during most of the match and Wimbledon’s accurate lineout also to be superior, Max Freeman and Jake Cleet being especially successful.
The match started with Wimbledon conceding a penalty after three minutes for offside in the centre but Havant failed to take advantage, that switched to Wimbledon when the first yellow card was issued on 13 minutes and a series of penalties near the Havant line led to the ball being spread to the left wing and Brad Pinkham scoring near the corner. The conversion attempt was missed but with Havant back to full strength, on 24 minutes they scored a try to make the score Havant 8 – Wimbledon 5, the conversion attempt by centre Joel Knight was also missed off the post. A few minutes later he earned the second yellow card for the home team, the match was fairly even up to half-time with the visitors unable to take advantage of the yellow card.
The second half started with penalties being exchanged but Wimbledon’s forwards making driving mauls and one especially very ambitious maul starting outside the Havant 22 metre line but being stopped just 10 metres from the try line.
The match swung to the visitors on 60 minutes with a break from scrum half Alex Kerr from just inside his own half to near the try line, he was hunted down by the defenders but a well-timed pass to right wing Ollie Kitto saw him score the second try again without conversion, but Wimbledon taking the lead 13-11.
The last quarter became very tense with only one mistake able to change the outcome, but on 76 minutes a high kick to the corner led to a high tackle on the Wimbledon defender and the award of the third yellow card to Havant who finished the match with fourteen players. The outcome was sealed in injury time when Wimbledon pressure led to a penalty kick to the corner and the following lineout being won, a series of penalties near to the Havant line followed without Wimbledon being able to score and finally after some backchat from Havant to the referee he reversed a penalty originally awarded to Havant into a penalty awarded to Wimbledon, the kicking tee was run on to the pitch before Wimbledon captain Paul Hendry had made his decision and Ed Morgan kicked the final points to seal victory 16 – 11.
Next Saturday Wimbledon take on Sutton & Epsom at home with a 2.30pm kick-off.
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November 1, 2022