Playing good open rugby right from the kick off, Blaydon never at any point looked in danger of losing this match, despite a very early successful Chester penalty after just three minutes of play. From then on Blaydon kept the Chester defence busy with constant line breaks, particularly from their centres Alex Clark and James Cooney.

It was one of those breaks on 15 minutes which was made by Clark who broke away from inside the Blaydon half up to the Chester 22 line where he sent in an unmarked Cooney for the first points which John Clarkson converted .

Blaydon’s second try of the match came after 26 minutes of play and when Clark was only part held in a tackle and the ball was shipped to prop Philip Brantingham who powered over to score under the posts, although on this occasion the conversion was surprisingly missed.

On the half hour, a bout of poor tackling by Blaydon allowed Chester their first and only try of the game and the conversion kick by the prolific boot of Reeve from wide out was successful (12-10).

Chester were using the impressive kicking power of their number 10 as one of their main tactics but on 27 minutes one of his clearance kicks was fielded by Jonny Ashman who cleverly chipped over his opposite number, fielded the ball and passed to fly half Dan Marshall, who raced in to score under the posts and the successful conversion made it 19-10.

Just before the half time whistle sounded Chester’s fly half Reeve, kicked a huge penalty from just within his own half to make the score 19-13 at the break.

Half Time Blaydon 19 v Chester 13

Chester lost their number 8 to the bin immediately after the restart and within minutes of this happening, young winger Tristan Sommersall took a clever switch from Ashman and he then broke a tackle to power over wide out for the fourth try and bonus point which John Clarkson successfully converted to make the score 26-13.

Chester then immediately replied with two penalties, one from close range and the other from yet another huge kick taken from within their own half making it taking the score to 26-19

Back came Blaydon, and a successful line out win near the Chester 20m line was followed by an impressive rolling maul all the way to the try line which Liam Wright dotted down, the successful, difficult conversion by Clarkson making the score 33-19.

5 minutes later and another powerful rolling maul took the ball to the Chester 22 and scrum half Clarkson made a break open and produced a clever pass back inside to Sommersall who darted in for his second try, the conversion being unsuccessful meant the final score was 38-19.

Blaydon signing off their last home game of the season at Crow Trees ground having won 4 of their last 5 home games bodes really well for next season.

Full Time: Blaydon 38 v Chester 19

Blaydon: Appleton, Ashman, Cooney, Clark, Sommarsall, Marshall (C), Clarkson, Brantingham, Gray, Dodds, Wright, Phillips, Chaplin, Harrison, Charlton.

Replacements: Winter, Fearn, Hall-Lyon, Richardson, Bailey

 

Chester: Long, Roberts, Craven, Scott, Malik, Reeve, Phillips, Woods, Robson, Williams, Spalding, Lloyd, Wilkinson, Baxter, Ford

Replacements: Cleverley, Reed, Jones, Farrar, Brearley

 

REFEREE:   Adam Wookey

ATTENDANCE:  207

STAR MAN:  Blaydon – Tristan Sommarsall

 

Scorers:

Blaydon 38

Tries:  Cooney 11, Brantingham 19, Marshall 30, Sommersall 46, 65, Wright 59

Conversions: Clarkson 12, 31, 47, 60

Penalties:

 

Chester 19

Tries:   Long 23

Conversions: Reeve 24

Penalties: Reeve 2, 40, 48, 54