HASTINGS AND BEXHILL III 88 GILLINGHAM ANCHORIANS III 5

Gillingham arrived early with only 14 players, but at least they turned up.

After some negotiation Hastings lent them 2 players for the duration of the game, and thanks should go to new players Nick Webb and Paul Willard for showing the true spirit of Rugby by volunteering to help out.

The first ten minutes gave no clue as to the carnage that would follow. Hastings started with Alex Nicholls converting a penalty in the first five minutes but it looked like the Gillingham forwards would hold their own against the mixed experience Hastings pack. Unfortunately for the visitors this was not to be the case.

Flanker Chris Jarvis was the first to score and this opened the floodgates, further tries from Richard Lawless, Matt Bumpass and young winger Scott Hopkins (brother of Ryan) and 5 conversions from the boot of Alex Nicholls helped Hastings to a 38-0 lead in 30 minutes.
 
The Gillingham pack to their credit kept trying, and from a line out in the Hastings 22 a well worked break off the back of the catch and a drive resulted in Gillingham getting on the scoreboard, although the conversion was missed. 38-5 at half time.

As the nice weather had pulled out quite a few Hastings players wholesale changes were made in the break. Dave Hirst ,Karl Bramwell  ,Ricky Cowlard, Roger Kingstone and the returning Brian McNeilly all made an appearance as well as new prop Tom Monks who replaced the injured Terry Dorey.

Hastings started the second half where they left of the first. The backs running riot from the kick off, Scott Hopkins ran in another 4 tries of his own to take his tally to 5, Matt Bumpass rumbled over for his second, and shortly afterwards another new player, winger Jake O'Brian, scored his debut try of the club .

The next part some of you will scarcely believe as it has probably never happened before but Chairman Dave Hirst managed to, firstly catch 2 consecutive passes, and even more amazingly run half the length of the pitch without dropping the ball to score 2, yes 2 tries. Gillingham could not realise how unlucky they were for this to have happened and it just about summed up their day.

As Hastings had scored on nearly every play the opposition asked to end the game 15 minutes early which the referee duly did.

Despite neither of them not scoring the half back partnership of Eames at 10 and and Stuart Gow at 9 controlled the game and created width and a special mention should go to the new boys,Tom,Jake, Paul and Nick for their Stirling efforts
 
Despite the score Gillingham to their credit played their hearts out and I am sure that it will be a much closer game when we visit them next year.