Ellingham & Ringwood 1st XV welcomed local rivals Bournemouth to the Raymond Brown Memorial Game for a league game and it was back to attritional rugby for the first forty minutes of the game in a tightly contested first half. It was the away team that drew first blood in the 5th minute of the game when their scrum half Benjamin Hogan intercepted and darted over the line following and they added the two points to give them an early 7 point lead. It did not take the home team long to responed in the 10th minute following excellent work from his team mates it led to second row George Randall to power his way over the line and close to the posts to give Chris Frost playing on the right wing an easy kick to level the scores.

Eight minutes later appropriately Dan Jackson playing at number eight drove hard towards the try line and could not be stopped by Bournemouth's defence as he went over for the first try of the hat trick that he was to achieve that afternoon, again the kick for goal was an easy one for Frost who was able to put Ellingham ahead for the first time in the game. Within the space of three minutes Bournemouth's flanker Joseph Wyse-Pulson ran a great line slicing through Ellingham's defence to score a try under the posts which he team mate duly converted to level the socres once more. Both teams battled it out to try and gain the upper hand, Ellingham defended stoutly at times and Captain Sammy Veneroso playing at scrum half was sent to the sin bin for ten minutes following an infringement in the red zone to make life a little harder for the home team. As mentioned though they defended stoutly and then on the brink of half time Daniel Jackson muscled his way over the try line to give Ellingham the lead and with Frost making the conversion it gave the home team a 21- 14 half time lead.

Ellingham back to their full quota of players and attacking the SPECSAVERS end of the ground in front of a large crowd were relentless in their attack, but they could not breakdown the away teams defence until the 57th minute when number eight Dan Jackson achieved his hat trick and once again Frost was able to convert for the additional two points. The team try of the day went to centre Connor Hamerston who was on the end of some free flowing rugby from the home team to dive SPECTACTULARLY in the left hand corner of the pitch to the delight of the home fans in the 62nd minute, this time Frost was unfortunate not to land his kick for the extra two points. Then in the 69th minute Hugo "Bosh" Leigh Watts playing on the left wing darted through to score a well worked try which Frost was able to convert. Despite losing players to injuries Bournemouth battled hard and their hard work paid off in the 72 minute with their third try of the game and again the conversion was successful.

The last points scored on the day went to the home team with George Randall getting his brace of tries in 75th minute, although Bournemouth strived to get a fourth try for that bonus point they just fell short of that goal and the final scored was Ellingham & Ringwood 45 - Bournemouth 21. Ellingham travel to Eastleigh in 2 weeks time which could be a difficult game and to try and maintain their push for promotion as they now sit 3 points behind Gosport & Fareham in 3rd place in Counties League 1.

Man of the match: Chris Hancock 6 (pictured)

Cheers
Swede