Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
Developing a handy
them and Canterbury were able to ask questions of their own.
It allowed Tom Best to add a penalty goal to his conversion of Hilton’s try but Atkins responded after Hugh Mccormick-huston was sin-binned for a technical offence.
Despite the shortage of manpower, Canterbury then demonstrated a growing confidence by launching a massive drive from a lineout.
Scrum half Dan Smart made the touchdown and Best, immaculate with his kicking, narrowed the deficit to three points.
A five-minute period of the second half swung the momentum decisively Canterbury’s way. One of their greatest weapons is pace and in the 50th minute, Martyn Beaumont fielded a clearance kick, spotted an opportunity on the narrow side and delivered the inside pass for Smart to claim his second try.
The fourth, bonus point score was engineered from good lineout ball, a lot of swift hands to the wide channels where JJ Murray’s pace saw him beat everyone.
Best converted both tries and suddenly the city side were 11 points clear. Was it enough? Rams, now bossing the set scrums, ramped up the pressure for Chico U’chong to dart over allowing Atkins to convert. But when it comes to protecting their assets, Canterbury are a hard-nosed lot these days and they shut the door effectively. Canterbury: A.moss, G.hilton, JJ Murray, W.farris, M.beaumont, T.best, D.smart, J.green (repl A.cooper), T.rogers (repl F.edwards). S.kenny (repl J.green), G.edwards, T.burns, T.edwards (repl C.townley), S.rogers, H.mccormick-huston.