Farnborough 2s 0 v 54 Farnham 2s

Eager to play, Farnham were out of the blocks quickly and with five minutes on the clock has already scored two tries, with Farnborough barely touching the ball. First Henry Milas and then Craig Macey crossed the whitewash, one of which was converted by the evergreen Nigel Rooney, the score stood at 0-12.

Thinking that this was going to be a walk over, Farnham became confident and this allowed Farnborough back into the game as the Hornets overcomplicated moves and forgot they had to play through the phases to break the opposition down. Farnborough had the visitors under pressure for long passages of play but the Hornets defence held out. Then just before half time, with the hosts on the attack, Tom Coussins read the play and made an interception to race clear and score under the posts, the conversion extending the lead to 0-19.

At half time, Farnham spoke about maintaining their defensive line and being less frantic in attack. Words that fell on deaf ears at the start as Farnborough had the better of the early exchanges. But the pattern of play was not helped by a number of off the ball incidents that went unpunished as Farnborough sought to degenerate the game into a boxing session. It is credit to the Farnham team that they largely rose above the ‘cheap shots’ and refocused to give the opposition a rugby lesson.

It took until midway through the half for Farnham to settle down and, concentrating on playing the phases, the Hornet exposed the gulf in class eventually running away with the game. A further five tries were scored in the last quarter; a brace for Sam Greensitt, and one each for James Mills, James Franklin and Henry Milas. With all converted by Rooney the final score stood at 0-54.

Although the score-line reflected the one sided nature of the game, both sides would have benefitted from the run out. For Farnham, it emphasised once again that when they concentrate on their game they can be a match for anyone. This game will give Farnham confidence going into next weekends fixture, a home league game against top of the table Old Wimbledonians. 3pm kick off at Wrecclesham.