PUDDLETOWN 20

OAKMEADIANS 17

DESPITE the best efforts of the weather, Puddletown shone through to beat Oakmeadians 20-17 in the Dorset Senior Vase.

The Villagers achieved their first win of the season against an Oaks side that they lost to two weeks ago in the league.

Puddletown took the lead five minutes in, with winger Jacob Holt scoring a try in the corner before James Elwood converted from the touchline.

Elwood was also next on the scoresheet, this time converting a penalty after the Oaks were penalised.

The visitors were not giving up and Sam Morton scored their first try through a driving maul from the five-metre line, the conversion was missed, making the score 10-5 to Puddletown.

The Villagers continued to play the more attacking rugby.

The returning Tom Yeatman broke through the Oaks’ line and off-loaded to Baz Dovell, who cut back inside and powered over to score and Elwood again converted making it 17-5 at half-time.

The second half started in much the same vein as the first, with Puddletown showing all the signs of being able to cope with the horrendous conditions better than Oaks.

The home side were awarded a penalty 15 minutes into the second half, with Oaks being adjudged offside.

Elwood successfully kicked the ball between the goal posts bringing the score to 20-5.

However, the men in red took their foot off the gas and the Oaks started to come back into the game with Oscar Brown scoring an unconverted try to make it 20-10.

The side from Bournemouth were working incredibly hard to put up a good fight to claim the spoils in this first round match and they were the next to put points on the board with Joshua Miles scoring an individual try, running in from the halfway line.

This time, Harry Wescot made the conversion to narrow the score to 20-17 and the Puddletown defence held out until the final whistle

They go on to meet Blandford at Greenfields in the next round on Saturday, October 13.

Puddletown’s success rounded off a successful weekend for the Villagers, following the hosting of South Dorset’s Social Rugby Gala on the preceding evening.

The event also saw the official switch on of their upgraded floodlit pitch facility and the club welcomed Weymouth, Swanage & Wareham, Oakmeadians and Bournemouth RFCs to the club and saw 80 players from the five clubs enjoying the evening rugby activities.

Puddletown’s Social/Seconds won both of their games with the club having a clean sweep of victories over the weekend.

Spokesman Ray Stephens added that these Friday night fixtures are a great way to get games played and enable those with work commitments on Saturdays to be able to play rugby where previously under our old floodlights it was difficult, we have fielded over 45 players this weekend which is fantastic for our club and for local rugby generally and tonight was a great success.

Our floodlight upgrade project has been a while coming and we thank the help and support received in providing grant aid to assist the funding of this project, namely the Rugby Football Foundation, West Dorset District Council and Dorset and Wiltshire RFU. Thanks also to the organisation and support of Dorset and Wilts support staff.

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