Stanford 64 v 17 Bancroft
KEEN to show that last weeks second half performance wasn’t to be repeated, Stanford looked to get out of the blocks early by scoring early. Stanford did exactly this with four tries in the opening 25 minutes. Coming from Neil Cockrell, Troy Elkes and a brace from Ali MacDonald who was only in his second game back from injury. Stanford continued to dominate the ball throughout the first half and despite two tries from Bancroft, Stanford never looked troubled. A quick flowing counter-attack from Stanford late in the first half lead to Liam Morley’s first try of the day, shortly before he was shown a yellow card for a cynical ruck infringement.
Stanford were now out to show that they were not only going to see this game out but assert their dominance and continue to score points at will. With Bancroft tiring, Stanford’s backs had the run of the mill and it wasn’t too long into the second half when Jared Gounden and Tom Tressider, who replaced Liam Morley after his sin bin, crossed over to extend Stanford’s lead. By this point the game was opening up and Stanford were dominating the set pieces, with their forwards even having the chance to make big runs up the pitch.
With Daniel May going down with cramp, Clive Broad entered the pitch at front row and Liam Morley re-entering to replace Jack Kenworthy. With a reshuffled back line Stanford had one last flurry of tries up their sleeve with Jared Gounden and Liam Morley both grabbing their second tries of the day, either side of Ali MacDonald completing his hat-trick. A dominant 64-17 win for the red men, a game that they controlled throughout and should have scored even more. Stanford welcome Kings Cross Steelers to The Rec next time out.
