Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
Blues keep calm and carry on winning
Mal Graves praised his players’ composure as Whitstable survived early pressure to record a ninth consecutive win in Shepherd Neame Kent 2.
Visitors Dartford Valley threw everything at the Blues in the opening quarter on Saturday but the home side stood firm before easing to victory with two tries in each half.
Player-coach Graves – who sat the game out – said: “Dartford are a decent side and came hard at us from the start. They enjoyed a sustained period of pressure but the boys just looked composed.
“They did not panic, they defended well, they did not give away any penalties and they exited well. It shows the players definitely have faith in what we are doing.”
Pitch conditions at Reeves Way were hard underfoot but both coaches agreed they were happy to play and the first points came from a Kieran Woolf try that went unconverted.
Teenage full-back James Garland claimed the second and with Andy Huey adding the conversion, Whitstable led 12-0 at half-time.
The Blues conceded just three penalties in the first half, compared with Dartford’s 13 but in the second half, the referee began to find more fault in their play with Leeroy Chaipa, Luke Bowers and Ben Cliff all receiving yellow cards.
It meant the Blues played much of the half with 14 but it did not stop them adding two more tries, the first through Andy Newman and the other from Chaipa, which was converted by Huey. Graves said he felt the Blues could still be more ruthless but was pleased with the effort of his forwards. He added: “The scrum worked well. We did some work on it this week and it was far more cohesive.”
Whitstable’s win keeps them in second and on Saturday they are due to travel-to-next-to-bottom Shooters Hill whose last home game ended in a 100-7 defeat to third-placed Foots Cray.
The South East London side forfeited their fixture at Faversham on Saturday. Faversham travel to Lordswood this weekend. Whitstable prop Luke Pepper takes the game to Dartford Valley on Saturday