THURROCK 24

ROMFORD & GIDEA PARK 20

Back row man Dwayne Bishop bagged two tries as Thurrock came from behind to win a dour end-of-season friendly.

London One side Thurrock gave debuts to forwards John Stapley and Christian Rate but were unable to find their feet and ended up 17-0 down through two converted tries and a penalty.

End-of-season friendly or not, Thurrock were stung into action and fought their way back with a try from Bishop.

The forward, who had been switched to the back row from hooker early on, was stopped short of the line following a strong run but managed to wriggle his way free to touch down.

Steve Morritt converted and Paul Ansell followed up Bishop's try with another similar effort to make it 17-12 at half-time.

Within seconds of the restart the game turned on a terrible mistake by Romford. A Park player spilled the ball as he tried to run out from behind his posts and the grateful Morritt seized it to give Thurrock the lead, converting the try himself.

Although Romford immediately kicked another penalty, a second try from the impressive Bishop sealed the victory for Thurrock.

It could even have been a bigger scoreline had not three seemingly good tries been ruled out by the referee.

Westcliff fall to powerful Brentwood

Geoff Tennant scored one of three tries for Westcliff under-15s in their game against Essex Cup winners Brentwood.

It was a valiant performance by the lads who fell just two conversions short of a draw. The team's other tries came from Tom Fullerton and Steve Thomas.

Touch down - Geoff Tennant

Picture: LUAN MARSHALL

Champs crash to Earth

ROCHFORD 12

BRENTWOOD 27

Newly-crowned London Three champions Rochford were brought back to earth in a friendly against London Two side Brentwood at Magnolia Road.

Brentwood's more efficient forward unit ground down the home side's defence to run out winners by four tries to two, although the scoreline did not reflect how close the game had been.

Brentwood took the lead against the run of play when a mistake in the Rochford 22-metre area allowed their opponents' centre to pounce on a loose ball to run in unopposed. Brentwood converted to take a 7-0 lead.

Rochford responded smartly and Andy Baker used his speed and resolve to go over for a deserved try in the corner.

The home side were competing well up front, although opportunitites were wasted through poor ball retention and stout tackling by Brentwood, who had extended their lead to 14-5 by half-time.

Rochford hit back at the start of the second half when John Payne finished off a fine move under the posts to set up an easy conversion for Mark Sexton.

At this stage Brentwood's forwards began to dominate the scrums and scored an unconverted try and penalty to edge further away from their hosts.

Rochford were not helped by injuries to Ryan Jones, Andy Hawes and Ryan Stephenson and Brentwood sealed their win with another try.

Tour-de-force for Wyverns

LOWESTOFT&YARMOUTH 35

RAYLEIGH WYVERNS 24

Rayleigh's end-of-season mini-tour ended in a late defeat when they blew a three-point lead in the final minutes.

Led from the front by tour captain Martin Miller, Rayleigh had established a 24-21 lead through tries from Gary Watts, man-of-the-match Gary Taylor, Bradleigh Coker and Rob Lagden, who added two conversions.

But two late tries ended their hopes of returning from Lowestoft and Yarmouth with a victory to round off another successful tour.

Stanford on cruise control

STANFORD-LE-HOPE 53

BURNHAM-ON-CROUCH 13

Tetley's Vase semi-finalists Stanford made mathematically sure of the Eastern Counties Three (south) championship with another crushing victory.

Stanford effectively won the title with last week's win over Old Palmerions but they could mathematically still have blown it if they lost their final three matches by a combined total of more than 300 points.

Obviously that was never going to happen - but they had more trouble than they expected in this match. Burnham had built a 10-7 half-time lead with a dubious tactical approach of smothering the ball and keeping it out of Stanford's hands.

Presumably they feared Stanford's attacking speed, for the second-half was a different story. Burnham kicked off and Stanford prop Kevin Dann powered over for his first try of the season.

"After that they just gave in," said Stanford fly-half Jamie Daisley. "We scored almost 50 points in the second-half - and to do that you have to have something approaching a perfect performance."

Within seconds of Dann's try, scrum-half Owen Carney charged down a defensive kick by Burnham following a scrum five yards out and pounced on the ball to score.

It was big relief for Carney, who had earlier unluckily had his pass intercepted for Burnham's first and only try in the opening half.

The floodgates really opened then and Stanford scored further tries through inspirational skipper Richard Elder, a brace from Mark Connelly, and one from Scott Cooper, whose good work had set up Reese Anderson for his side's first-half try.

There were also two tries from full-back Gavin Scott, who is running away with the battle to become the Eastern Counties top try scorer. The double made it 35 on the season.

Dave Kelway was not his usual self on the kicking front but still managed to boot four conversions to round off another dominating Stanford show.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.