Thornton scores four tries on debut

DEBUTANT Liam Thornton made his mark as he ran in four tries to ease Esher to a 13-try victory over Westcliff.

The hosts were on the front foot from the start, with Hugh Sloan first to score before a dominant Esher maul five minutes later led to prop Theo Skoumbourdis touching down, before Phil Cokanasiga scored the first of his eventual hat trick.

The home side’s bonus point try came thanks to a break from Jack Lavin which found the hands of Sam Bullock, who thundered over in the corner to score, though the wind blew Morley’s conversion off-course.

Further first-half tries followed from Liam Thornton and Cameron Wilkins, before a second each for Cokanasiga and Thornton, the latter two of which followed wellplaced grubber kicks from Tomek Pozniak.

The hosts came out flying in the second half, with tries for Tomek Pozniak and an impresBARNES

TEAMS

ESHER: Lavin, James, Cokanasiga, Rawstron-Rudd, Pozniak, Morley, Bullock, Coutts, Vajner, Skoumbourdis, Sloan, Bullett, Wilkins, Thornton, Dow.

Replacements: Crawley, Lowes, Scott, Thompson, Lang.

WESTCLIFF: Name withheld, Olanrewaju, Bannister, Gladdish, Ajeigbe, Whiting, Barrell, Brown, Morrant, Binneman, Doyle, Maloney, Hogarth, Dufficy, Nicholls.

Replacements: Richmond, Robbins, Miller, Morrant.

REFEREE: Ben Wood ATTENDANCE: 320 Star man

Liam Thornton - Esher

sive score from Joe Vajner following a tenacious break from Sam Morley.

Westcliff finally managed to score in the 63rd minute thanks to some solid attacking work by the forwards, eventually finding hooker Billy Morrant who shoved through Esher’s defences, before a successful conversion from Ross Gladdish.

Although the visitors kept fighting, they failed to score despite Esher’s Jack Lavin being sent to the sin bin. The final quarter saw two more scores from Thornton, before Cokanasiga completed his hat-trick in the dying seconds.