In their first league game for several weeks, the Men’s 1sts overcame a plucky Colchester side which suffered more than its fair share of injuries, as well as the loss of a player to the first team squad for a National Division 3 game kicking off an hour later, and ran in eight tries.

On a bright, sunny late autumn day, Ealing began strongly. Evergreens captain Jake Usher, helping out at 2nd row for the day, took a clean lineout catch after 8 minutes, and the ball was quickly fed out to the backs, with centre Brenton Gibson breaking through some unconvincing tackles to score a try well converted by fly half Max McMinn. Soon afterwards No 8 Alfie Hill seemed to touch down, but the referee was unsighted and awarded an attacking scrum, at which the Colchester pack illegally prevented a score to leave the referee with no option but to award a penalty try. With 25 minutes gone, the Ealing backs were under pressure from untidy lineout possession but burst out of defence to enable Gibson to notch his second score of the day.

A high tackle as the score was being made resulted in Ealing restarting with a penalty, but Colchester intercepted an attempted kick over the defence and scored a converted try. The momentum swung towards the home team, with a second try soon following from a kick and chase. Slightly against the run of play, Ealing finished the first half with the bonus-point fourth try scored by Abdou Traore, admirably filling in at 2nd row for the day.

Ealing began the second half brightly and scored through left wing Andre Adeleke. Within a minute Adeleke was on the score sheet again, this time with a longer-range effort. Hooker Chris Joyce linked with the backs to add to the try tally, and with 10 minutes left the visitors reached the half-century with a good finish by right wing Rasaan Samms.

Team:

Vosabalavu, Joyce, Nash, Usher, Traore, T. Gibson, S. Miller, Hill, Gillespie, McMinn, Adeleke, Townshend, B. Gibson, Samms, Nolan-Hutchinson
Replacements: McDonagh, Walker