Wanstead 27 - 5 Ipswich

In this, the second of a series of trips into deep Essex, the Black & Golds fought hard throughout the match against second placed Wanstead eventually losing by something of a distance with the Herons sealing their victory with two injury time tries.

It was the visitors who scored first after 7 minutes, with former Ipswich Colts centre Luke Uru dashing past a somewhat flat-footed Wanstead defence to score in the corner following some good work by Ben Grimwood.

Ipswich dominated the early exchanges. In offence Corey Button and Grimwood escaped the clutches of what appeared a sluggish Wanstead midfield on several occasions allowing debutant winger Tyler Beales some early opportunities. Carlton Littlechild switched to centre this week looked an authoritative figure for Ipswich.

The Ipswich pressing defence forced several errors as the Herons tried to build a response.

As the game moved in to second quarter, Beales escaped down the Ipswich left and found lock Monty Douglas in support. Beales delayed his pass and, as the Wanstead winger tackled him, his smart pass to Douglas was adjudged to be forward.

Moments later following an Ipswich infringement, Wanstead kicked the ball deep into the Ipswich ‘22’ and secured a line-out. The ball moved across the field left to right with some committed Ipswich defence keeping the home side out. Sadly for Ipswich, as Wanstead continued in possession and went through their phases, the ball switched to the other side and a half-break in midfield saw a smart offload to Wansteads hooker allowing a simple try and conversion (7-5).

Ipswich continued to press forward but repeatedly lost possession at the breakdown. Wez Vakadranu was introduced into the Ipswich back row and made a couple of smart tackles which shook things up a little.

On 38 minutes, the referee yellow carded the powerful Pacific Islander, for an alleged high tackle. Wanstead attacked and, following a further Ipswich infringement, the home side hit a simple penalty to lead at the interval (10-5).

After the break, Ipswich won a line-out on half way through their giant lock Mike Graham and moved the ball into midfield. A handling error resulted in Wanstead retrieving the ball and, in a flash they were up the Ipswich right scoring in the corner as the young Uru slipped off a tackle (15-5).

Vakadranu was reintroduced and a rejuvenated Ipswich then mounted a series of attacks.

Their best effort saw Button and Jake Steward combining to go very close up the left touch line, whilst several other half-breaks, similarly, could not be converted to points. Lock Graham and skipper Adam Pickering started to carry down the centre more frequently and Jake Goodwin was thundering around the field like a man possessed. The home side were tiring, and, just as in the previous encounter this season, a series of injury delays conveniently started to break up the Ipswich patterns and provide the home side a couple of lengthy rest periods.

Ipswich, despite their efforts, simply could not convert possession in to points and so the match turned in to something of an arm-wrestle with the score remaining locked at 15-5 until the referee started a lengthy period of injury time in which two late Wanstead scores were conceded – the Essex boys securing a bonus point win.