In selection, the late withdrawal of Adam Cambridge saw Ed Salmon move into the second row, with Carl Tappin moved to the blindside, whilst Andy Cooper replaced Mario Da Silva on the wing.
With a fierce cross wind, Wallingford kicked off, which just about made ten meters, as Wallingford retained possession. The gameplan for both sides was clear, keep the ball tight and attack the fringes, and this was the general pattern of the game throughout. Another trend that soon emerged was Wallingford’s complete domination at the scrum, as they regularly marched Stow back, and often opted to scrum from penalties as opposed to kicking for territory, with line-outs so troublesome in the wind.

After soaking up some early pressure from Stow, led by their abrasive No.8, Wallingford began to create chances of their own, with Harvey Bateman, as so often this season, blasting through the opposition defence almost at will at times. With Stow getting on the wrong side of the referee, Wallingford enjoyed plenty of possession for the remainder of the half, and should have scored on several occasions, with a couple of clear chances butchered. They were finally rewarded for their domination as Jermaine Webster showed great strength to barrel over for a deserved try.

The last five minutes saw Monk sin-binned for an infringement at the breakdown, and the Stow full-back converted well in tricky conditions, to bring Stow to within 2 points, which is how the half ended.
Stow started the second half much the better, as they began to find some parity in the scrum and their discipline improved, whilst Wallingford were a bit slow out of the blocks.

With Marris still off the pitch, a break from the Stow No.8 from a scrum on the visitor’s twenty-two took the ball to within five yards, and after several attempts for the line, a Stow forward eventually burrowed over for a converted try.

The next twenty minutes was dominated by the weather, as the ball rarely left the central third of the pitch, and even less frequently did it leave the left hand side of the pitch, as the wind made it nearly impossible to move the ball to the right. The defining feature of this period was the sheer number of line-outs that took place, with at least twenty line-outs, which were invariably a lottery.

But just as it looked like the game was petering out into a windy, muddy mess, an inspired break from Tom Swainston and consequent kick ahead saw Wallingford awarded a scrum just short of the Stow line. Ironically, the scrum was unable to shunt its way over, but Wallingford crucially remained in the Stow twenty two. And with just five minutes to go, after a brief spell of pressure, it was Tom Swainston again who jinked through from fifteen yards and showed great strength to ground the ball under pressure, critically right under the posts. With the scores level at 10-10, it was down to Phil Dawes to convert in horrible conditions. And after some typical gamesmanship from Dawes, he casually converted to give Wallingford a two point lead with just minutes left.

Stow came back strong, and went through several phases as they tried to go through and around Wallingford, but Wallingford’s much criticised defence held firm, and held on for a rare, but deserved, away win.

This was a good performance from Wallingford, carrying on from the Bletchley game, as they played the conditions well. Built on the huge performance of the scrum, Wallingford stuck to the gameplan, didn’t over-complicate things, and their defence was vastly improved.

There were good performances all over the pitch, with Jermaine Webster carrying on his fine recent form, but Man of the Match went to Tom Swainston, who remained calm in apocalyptic conditions and ultimately won Wallingford the match (with a little help from Phil).

1.Marris 2.Zaluzny 3.Welch 4.Bailey 5.Salmon (Pryor 25, O’Donovan 65), 6.Tappin 7.Norris 8.Webster 9.P.Dawes 10.Swainston 11.Smith 12.Holton 13.Bateman 14.Cooper 15.Kitts