Ellingham and Ringwood 21 - Portsmouth 14

We produced an amazing performance on Saturday to beat Portsmouth 21-14 in Hampshire Counties Division 1 and record our first ever victory over the big city club.

There was a large crowd for the game, with a pre-match roast lunch available for supporters and a minute's silence observed before the game, following the tragic and sudden death of former player Andrew Galloway. His partner Alison and three sons Angus, Ed and Hugh, who had all played junior rugby for the club, were present. Andrew had coached one of the club's age groups right through from the under 6's to under 18's age group and was a regular referee at the club's annual Good Friday touch rugby festival for over 20 years. The big crowd was also boosted by lots of support from our mini and junior teams.

There was no score in the first 27 minutes of the game, with both defences holding strong. The deadlock was eventually broken when we were awarded a penalty that our right wing Chris Frost kicked to give us a 3-0 lead. We'd dominated much of the first half having three tries held up over the line, but against the run of play, on a rare foray into our half, Portsmouth's number 8 Aaron Beesley crashed over to score the first try of the game. Their scrum half Thomas Sanderson kicked the conversion to give Portsmouth a 7-3 lead at half time.

We came out strongly in the second half and Chris Frost kicked two penalties to reduce the deficit. But Portsmouth fought back and their flank forward Alex Higson scored their second try, which Sanderson converted again to open up a 14-9 lead. With time running out, Corben Hills (pictured) came on to replace Chris Hancock as openside flanker and he scored a try in the 75th minute that Frost was able to convert to put us back into the lead. Frost then provided the last action of the game when he dived over in the corner to give us a well-deserved 21-14 victory.