Atkins sponsored Tadley 1st XV made the familiar trip down the A303 to Frome with both teams currently neck and neck in the league both teams would be determined to get the valuable points from this fixture. The Tadley side looking very similar to the one that beat Devizes with the exception of the rotation of props Gordon Grierson for Chris Clifford and Gareth Cripps was committed this week having his bunion treated so Stuart Hutchinson stepped in on the wing for his second 1st XV start of the season.

Tadley once again were determined to start strongly and using the slope of the pitch to their advantage pinned Frome within their own half for the vast majority of the early encounters. With Darren Staley carrying well in the forwards and Alex Pike finding the gaps in the Frome three quarters Tadley appeared to be dominant. With the early pressure exerted by Tadley beginning to tell Chris Dennison punishing the Frome side for infringements at the srcummage opening the scoring with a penalty. Frome however showed they could score tries from anywhere against a poor defence the large left wing running through Tadley defenders to score under the Tadley posts.

Tadley did rally and again camped out in the Frome half and were again rewarded with a penalty that Chris Dennison kicked to take the score to 7 – 6. But again errors in defence let Tadley down and Frome made another break from inside their own half that resulted in a try. 14-6.

With only a few minutes remaining of the half Tadley found themselves in the position where Frome were now in their half and attacking their line, but a loose ball and quick thinking by full back Charlie Cox with a hacked through clearance saw Tadley behind the Frome defence for the first time. Chris Dennison gathered the ball who passed to Alex Pike scoring under the post s. With the conversion the half time score could not be much closer at 14 – 13 in favour of the home side.

The second half say Tadley struggling against the slope of the pitch and had to defend for long periods as Frome retained possession and when Tadley did have the ball they lacked the ability to get over the gain line. Frome crossed the Tadley line twice in this half when again defence could have been more positive. Tadley never really looked like scoring themselves in this half and saw the penalty count grow in Frome’s favour.

As the match became slightly fractious Tadley seemed to lose focus and time slipped away leaving men in gold without a away victory since the midpoint of last season.

Final Score 29 – 13 and Tadley knew that they were more than capable of turning over Frome in this fixture but lacked the ambition and self belief. Chris Dennison having another strong match with his place kicking keeping Tadley in the game and some impressive kicking out of hand earns a well deserved man of the match.

Team- Cox,Hutchinson,Pike,Williams,Davies,Dennision, Bailey, Grierson, Godfrey, Lowe(clifford 50), Murrau(C), Harris, Staley, Randall, Keeley