WINCHESTER Rugby Club’s first 15 travelled to Basingstoke last Saturday, and came home the victors by 79-7, cementing their position in the RFU’s Southern Counties 1 Hampshire league writes Tim Fell.

Winchester opened the scoring with a try for open-side flanker Wilf Nicholson, converted by fly-half Tom Fieldsend after ten minutes.

On the half-hour, Hampshire Society referee Rhys Cleary pinged Basingstoke for not releasing the ball at the breakdown, and Fieldsend added the three points: 0-10.

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Four minutes later, Mr Cleary awarded Winchester a free kick, and after some slick interpassing between backs and forwards spread the ball across the field, outside-centre Nic Esterhuizen was in for the try, duly converted by Fieldsend, bringing the score to 0-17.

Greg Sullivan, returning for Winchester after injury early in the season, gave Winchester attacking choices between fly-half and inside-centre, and shortly before half-time he put a cross-kick to the right-hand corner and Tolan touched down, only to be called back by Mr Cleary for offside.

Less than a minute later, Tolan put that right, running in for an unconverted try, and with the score at 0-22 the teams went into huddles with their coaches for half-time.

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Whatever the Basingstoke coach Andy Fields said to his team must have had an effect, because straight from the restart they caught the Winchester defence napping. Outside-centre Matt Buckingham took a pass from his brother Joel at scrum-half and touched down for a try, converted by fly-half Alfie Rowley.

Hampshire Chronicle:

Those seven points were to be the home team’s only score. As the second half wore on and Winchester’s superior fitness began to tell, the match became something of a procession. With all three Winchester substitutes on and Winchester’s forwards shoving set scrums back at will, tries followed for Sullivan for the bonus point, Fieldsend not bothering to call for his kicking tee and drop-kicking the conversion, second-row Patrick Dunne, scrum-half Connor Breen, winger Tom Forster, prop Ben Turner and hooker Jimmy Wallis, all but the last converted by Fieldsend.

“Wilf Nicholson was man of the match for me”, said Winchester coach Gaz Martin after the game. “Wherever the action was, he was in the middle of it. Cam Smith made his debut off the bench and impressed by his physicality. And young Nic Esterhuizen slotted in at outside centre as though he’d been playing in the team for years.”