St Francis Rugby Club finish on a high with victory over Shoreham

St Francis finished their season with an excellent 23-17 victory over Shoreham to secured third spot in the Sussex 2 League.
St Francis Rugby Club line-up after their victory against ShorehamSt Francis Rugby Club line-up after their victory against Shoreham
St Francis Rugby Club line-up after their victory against Shoreham

The game was always going to be a tight affair and St Francis took a 3-0 lead through a penalty after ill -discipline from Shoreham.

St Francis’ defensive resilience was finally broken when Shoreham responded with a try to take a 3–5 lead before Ryan Crawley added another penalty to put St Francis 6-5 in front at half-time.

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St Francis continued in the same spirit as the first half with Crawley slotting another penalty.

St Francis player Ryan Crawley, left, makes a tackle against Shoreham during their 23-17 winSt Francis player Ryan Crawley, left, makes a tackle against Shoreham during their 23-17 win
St Francis player Ryan Crawley, left, makes a tackle against Shoreham during their 23-17 win

At 9-5 up, St Francis were beginning to gain more confidence as the half went on and it was shown after Alistair Ellis finished an excellent move.

A great break from Warren Schulze led to Crawley offloading to Ellis to finish with a try and the conversion put St Francis 16–5 ahead.

A special mention here for Ellis, who has had an excellent season with St Francis - exciting times for the club as he is developing into an quality player.

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With St Francis continuing to dominate, they soon scored their second try of the match through Brian Lamplough.

Ferocious work from the home side’s pack, with the front row (Peacocke, Perry and Sparkes) dominating their Shoreham counterparts, gave Lamplough the chance to run from over from the scrum – another converted try.

St Francis were unlucky not to have been awarded a try before this as Ben Searle had been wrongly ruled out even though he had grounded the ball but due to positioning the referee did not see this after excellent sniping around the rucks from the scrum-half.

Shoreham responded in the last five minutes with two tries of their own but St Francis held on for a well deserved 23–17 victory.

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St Francis are already recruiting for next season so if you would like to be involved then please get in touch their website http://www.stfrancisrfc.com or Facebook page (@stfrancisrugby) or contact Alex Minnis on 07720344944.

St Francis: Etherington, Perry, Sparkes, Devlin, Crawley, Ellis, Wiseman, Lamplough, Searle, Goodayle, Schulze, Bruce, Morgan, Logan, Poole, Peacocke, Parsons, Bond

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