Bishop’s Stortford rugby club beat Tonbridge Juddians 63-21 in pre-season friendly

Bishop’s Stortford ran in nine tries as they began their pre-season campaign with a 63-21 home victory over Tonbridge Juddians on Saturday, writes John Allanson.

It was a really good workout for the two sides in a hard-fought and, at times, feisty friendly at Silver Leys, with all of the game’s 12 tries being converted.

The first 30 minutes was stop-start, with the flow being interrupted by frequent penalties, and the visitors certainly gave as good as they got.

The longer the game went on, though, the home side took firmer control with the forwards and backs combining to good effect.

Chris Smith and Alex Rayment both bagged braces for Stortford with their other tries being scored by new captain Will Rogers, Isaac Bell, Alex Gilham, Charlie Briers and Reece Lane.

Dotting down for Tonbridge were Curtis Barnes, Tom Kendall and Howard Packman.

Kicking the conversions for Stortford were Mike Cooke and David Hayes while Sam Evans also had a 100% record for the visitors.

At the same time at Silver Leys, a Stortford Blues side lost 39-26 to Harlow’s first team.

Tom Coleman’s team are back in action away to Cambridge and Shelford on August 24 and August 30 respectively.