Match Report:

Cobham 66 Andover 5

It was a tough day for Saxon Safety sponsored Andover made the journey to Surrey to take on high flying Cobham in the National Community cup.

Andover took the opportunity to utilise their full squad with many changes to the side and came up against a very strong home side in no mood to give any quarter.

In a tough physical but very fast attacking game, Andover tried to live with their opponents and at times played some very good rugby themselves, but early injuries to Jake Dixon and Roman Barton Knott didn’t help the cause as Cobham ran in several tries before Stan Pearson pulled one  back for the ‘All Blacks’

With man of the match Bryn Waite performing admirably in his first ever game an scrum half, and youngster Joey Yates making his debut at stand off, Andover managed to attack repeatedly and probably should have scored more tries themselves in an entertaining end to end game, but the home side were very clinical when given opportunities.  

Callum Barber Starkey, Stan North, skipper CJ Feirn and Waite were tireless in defence and there were promising performances from Keiron Bush, Matt Gates and Louis Shinton and a debut for Jamie Banks and club stalwart Tommy Gentleman at the ripe old age of 37.

In the end though Cobham were too much and ran in more tries towards the end as Andover tired.   

Afterwards Director of Rugby Andy Waite said ‘It was a good day out for us and gave us the chance to evaluate some players in first team conditions to see where development is needed. There were some very encouraging things today despite the scoreline and the only disappointment is that we didn’t score more ourselves as we created a lot of chances. My sincere thanks to Conor Green and Toby Dixon for very brave performances in the front row’.