Bracknell RFC fall to home defeat to Wimbledon

The hosts made a dream start when Under 17 scrum half Ally Walton – on debut – showed his pace to break clear from a ruck. He then found Neil Higgins who offloaded to Ian Burch to score under the posts.

Lachlan Valentine added the extras to put the Lily Hill men 7-0 up after five minutes.

Wimbledon responded with a try from centre Aaron Lowe, who found a large gap in the hosts’ defensive line before former Bracknell man Neil Hallett slotted the conversion.

In an end-to-end game, Bracknell then converted continuous pressure of the Wimbledon line into points. A number of driving mauls allowed Higgins to cross the try line before Valentine was again successful from the tee.

The visitors levelled matters again shortly after, however, as a deft kick from fly half Bryan Croke allowed back row Gary Crowe to re-gather the ball and send the stand-off under the Bracknell posts. Hallett’s kick made it 14-14.

A minute later Wimbledon took the lead as Hallett scored in the corner following a break down the Bracknell flank. He converted his own try to put his side 21-14 to the good.

There was still enough time on the clock for Bracknell to close the gap before half time, Jonny Mirza scoring in the corner after some sustained pressure. This time the conversion was missed, leaving Rory Greenslade-Jones’s men two points behind at the interval.

Wimbledon began the second half better than their hosts and extended their lead to 14 points courtesy of two tries from wing Tommy Moore, the second coming via an interception.

He came near to completing his hat-trick in the final minutes of the game, only to be hauled down by Ben Yates after he looked like finishing off another interception.

However, Wimbledon managed to recycle the ball and flanker Alex Cane eventually went over for his side’s sixth score of the afternoon.

Fourth-bottom Bracknell do not have a game this weekend, and return to action at relegation-threatened Gravesend on Saturday, April 2.