Counties Two Hampshire rugby: Free-flowing New Milton maintain title charge with victory over Alresford
Counties Two Hampshire
New Milton RFC 65
Alresford RFC 10
NEW Milton returned to winnings ways with an impressive 65-10 win over Alresford, taking the table-toppers’ league record to six wins from seven games.
Alresford started like a runaway train, scoring 10 points in the opening 10 minutes. However, Milton got back on track by sticking to their running and passing game to post 11 tries compared with the visitors’ two.
Alresford won a penalty from the kick-off, which they converted. Milton responded from a line-out, with Dalton Thomas making a break before passing to Ben Gould for the touchdown.
Alresford attacked and kicked ahead into Milton’s 22 and, during the follow-up, they won a penalty try after a New Milton infraction.
From a Milton scrum in the Alresford 22, Jude Payne broke away well before passing to Dalton Thomas to score.
The hosts then scored a succession of tries, starting with Charlie Jewiss using his pace to run from the halfway line to score, followed by Tom Gould running through the defence, and Joe Eldridge benefitting from a quickly taken penalty.
In the final moments of the half, from a line-out on the Alresford 10-metre line, Christian Brown made a break to score under the posts for a 36-10 half-time lead.
After the restart, Alresford put together a decent spell of possession and territory. However, once the hosts regained the ball, they broke at pace with Brown running in a converted try.
Alresford hit back well, with the forwards driving over the New Milton try-line. The hosts quickly won the ball from the kick-off before Jewiss burst through for another score.
New Milton had wind in their sails, and Nick McQueen scored a brace of tries, which bookended Jewiss scoring his third of the game after running half the pitch length.
Adam Lavis successfully kicked five of the 11 tries which Milton scored, while the player of the match went to Ed Hynd.
New Milton will face seventh-placed Chichester seconds away from home tomorrow (Saturday).
New Milton: E. Hynd, Z. Smith, T. Gould, B. Steers, J. Corbett, T. Wood, J. Payne, J. Lines, A. Lavis, C. Brown, L. Waugh, C. Jewiss, B. Gould, J.Eldridge, D. Thomas, G. Short, R. Richardson, N. McQueen.
