London 2 North Woodford 12 Sudbury 56 Sudbury travelled to East London on Saturday to play Woodford, opponents they have not met for approximately 20 years, and came away with a convincing win.
Hero of the day was Colin Humphreys, who had eight attempts at goal with the boot and slotted every one cleanly through the middle.
Both teams started at pace and for the first 20 minutes Woodford were able to match Sudbury in most areas of play. Woodford however did give away a lot of penalties in their effort to take the game to the visitors.
Shaun Smith scored after seven minutes when Sudbury threw the ball wide after a penalty line-out in the Woods’ 22.
After 20 minutes Sudbury started to take control of the game, good handling led to more fluid moves and Jonny Taylor scored on the half hour.
Henry Cowling was next on the score sheet and then Jack Dachtler under the posts, both tries as a result of good ball handling in the loose and providing Sudbury with the bonus point before half time.
Woodford then kicked for touch having been awarded a penalty and from a line-out in the Sudbury 22 they rolled the maul over the line to score, against the run of play and on the stroke of half-time.
After the break, and following a sustained ten minutes of Woodford pressure, Chris Whybrow and Smith scored from moves in the Woodford half and then Austin Beckett with a solo run from his own 22.
Woodford then got into the Sudbury red zone and their forwards crossed the stripe twice but were held up on both occasions, but, on the third attempt they let the backs have a go and a wide pass found the gap with half an hour of the half played. Jack Dachtler dominated the line-outs in the second period, disrupting the home side put in and enabling Sudbury to move the ball away into space, preventing any more forward moves and allowing the fitter Suffolk squad to continue to play the game at pace.
A deft cross field kick allowed Smith to sprint down the right wing to collect the ball and run in behind the posts for his hat-trick on the final whistle to complete a good win.
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