Hadleigh 10 Harlow 91

London Three North East

Harlow completely put Hadleigh to the sword on Saturday. The Suffolk club has been struggling since the season began but this was their biggest defeat yet.  In a weekend when league leaders Brentwood lost it now throws the league wide open. Harlow are now in third place with 8 points and only 20 points difference splitting the top 4. The home game against Diss this Saturday is a real crunch with a good win given the Rams at least a chance of going top.

Harlow were able to dominate in all areas of play and the forwards secured plenty of possession. For the first ten minutes the sides were sounding each other out before Howard went over in the corner.  Minutes later on the opposite wing Fozzie Brown the Harlow full back came onto the end of the three-quarter line and touched down in the corner to extend the lead to 10. Hadleigh rallied well and a penalty allowed them to get up to the Harlow 22. Some good use of the ruck and crash ball by their experienced but largely veteran pack took them close to the line allowing their full back to cut in for a try which he converted to cut the margin to 10 – 7.  Harlow countered almost immediately taking play deep into the Hadleigh half and setting up a forward drive for the try line. The home side stopped it but only by conceding a penalty. A kick to the corner, a clean lineout catch by Snow and the pack were rolling forward again. This time it was no mistake and Harlow loose head prop Ben Branch wrestled free of two defenders to touch down for his first try for the league team.  Immediately after the restart Harlow attacked again and this time it was Lock Jon Snow doing a great impression of a winger coming onto the end of the line to out-sprint to fullback to score on the other wing.  The next try only seconds later saw Simon Vanbeck who had moved to centre for this game step neatly round two defenders for the first of his three tries. Three tries in not much more than three minutes had destroyed any hope Hadleigh had of keeping in the game and to add insult to injury Lee Harron who had taken over kicking duties found his form and converted the last of them, the first of 8 he was going to slot during the day. This margin stimulated Harlow to concentrate on moving the ball wide to their backs at every opportunity and the result was devastating.  Further tries from wing Andy Vanston, Fozzie Brown and Lee Harron all converted made the score 48 – 7 at half time.

Howard opened the scoring in the second half taking an pass from Harron deep in the Harlow half and racing clear brushing off the final defender to score; Harron converted from well out. A good run by Vanbeck saw him score his second placing the ball the ball under the posts fro a simple conversion. Both he and Howard soon complete hat tricks with further tries and then Sean Banks playing at centre scored his first league try for Harlow proving too fast for the defence.  Good distribution by fly half Ben Jarvis had been an important factor in the avalanche of tries but with the clock running down he decided to go himself and scored 10 yard wide of the posts an easy conversion for Harron. Hadleigh added to their scoreline with a well struck penalty before the final score came from hooker Tommy Johnson just to emphasise that a workman like performance by the Harlow pack was a key feature of the success.

To their credit Hadleigh kept working to the end but the Harlow margin took a lot of discipline to achieve. The fact that every back got onto the try sheet shows that they stayed with the game plan throughout; not always easy when you have such a big skill advantage.

Tries: Matt Howard (3), Simon Vanbeck (3), Sean Banks, Andy Vanston, 

Francis Brown (2),  Lee Harron, Ben Branch, Jon Snow, Tommy Johnson, 

Ben Jarvis 

Conversions: Lee Harron (8)

1. - Ben Branch

2. - Scott Romaine

3. - Paul Prindiville (Sub Gary Brown  40mins)

4. - Jon Snow

5. - Paul Eynon (Captain)

6. - Scott Stoba

7. - Mark Pickett

8. - Lloyd Matchett (Sub Tommy Johnson 50mins)

9. - Lee Harron

10. - Ben Jarvis

11. - Andy Vanston

12. - Sean Banks

13. - Simon Vanbeck

14. - Matt Howard

15. - Francis Brown

Sub not used David Stradling

To view more match reports - click here

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge0

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge