For the first game of 2026, Ellingham & Ringwood 1st XV welcomed high flying Winchester to their ground to what was to be a difficult day for the Mighty E's. With the pitch looking pristine thanks to the hard work of our head groundsman Nick Wilson and his colleague Tony Farmer both teams and the crowd honoured the sad loss of Ventnor RFC's long time player Tristan 'Beast' Price who sadly passed away recently in a road accident with a minutes silence and not using their number 1 shirt in respect to him, his family and those involved in Ventnor rugby club who will be sadly missed. RIP yours in rugby.

As expected Winchester came out of the blocks strongly and in the eight minute their full back Thomas Hare crossed the white line for the first of many tries to follow that afternoon. Ellingham forwards were very competitive in the first half and matching their opposition in the scrum following some good work by the pack, prop Joshua Ajiboye (who was awarded player of the match by Winchester) muscled his way over the try line in the 17th minute to get the scoreboard rolling for the home team and Zach Morrish playing at scrum half slotted over the conversion to give the home the lead for what was to be the only time in the fixture.

The lead only lasted 3 minutes as Winchester hit back with their second try of the game which was converted by their scrum half Connor Breen and then in the 27th minute Breen darted his way through the Ellingham backs following some good work by their backs to score under the posts and duly converting for the additional two points. Three minutes later Winchester extended their lead with another try which again Breen converted and in the 30th minute they scored another try to secure their try bonus point. In the 35 minute Winchester's forwards got in on the act with Lewis Cleve going over for their fifth try of the half again Breen was able to convert. In the dying embers of the half Winchester threw out a loose pass which Ellingham winger Oscar Churchill latched onto hacking through twice and then collecting the ball to dive over in the far corner of the pitch to make the half time score Ellingham & Ringwood 12 - Winchester 40.

Winchester started the second half strongly with their winger Thomas Banks getting a brace of tries and his fellow winger Thomas Forster adding another try on the opposite flank. In all Winchester who were able to utilise a strong bench ran in another 5 tries with their centre Albert Mildenhall getting their final score. This did meant they had it all their own way as Ellingham pushed hard for a third try towards the end of the game attacking their home SPECSAVERS end of the ground, but dogged defence from the away team prevented them from achieving this.

Ellingham did prevent their opposition reaching 100 points, but only just with the final score being Ellingham & Ringwood 12 - Winchester 97.

Ellingham & Ringwood travel to Guildford next Saturday and hope that some more players will be back including their captain Sammy Veneroso.

Cheers
Swede