Twickenham heartbreak for battling Hampshire (From Daily Echo)

Twickenham heartbreak for battling Hampshire

7:10am Monday 16th May 2011 in Rugby

Gloucestershire’s highly talented side proved too strong for Hampshire at Twickenham, defeating them 62-30 in a pulsating National Under-20 Championship final on Saturday.

But if the west countrymen thought this was to be an easy afternoon for them, as many had predicted it would be, they were very wrong indeed.

For Hampshire were more than a match for their opponents, who were playing in their fourth successive final.

Gloucestershire were severely worried when Bath University fly-half Chris Lewis, originally from the Isle of Wight, fired three long-range penalties without reply in the opening nine minutes.

The favourites were back in it with a penalty from the reliable Brett Turner and then the first try of the afternoon when Cinderford’s Reuben Hail sprinted to the line unhindered.

But if anyone believed that Hampshire’s opening was just a false dawn, they were very much mistaken as, on 17 minutes, the ball was spun out to Fordingbridge’s James Hammond who found winger Myles Roberts-Bailey in space to score.

Lewis added the extras and then, two minutes later, Havant wingman Jaryd Robinson lurched for the line to ease Hampshire into a surprise 21-8 lead with a quarter of the game gone.

But the flow of the game was to turn on the half-hour when, for the first time in this epic Hampshire season, their scrum was moved backwards with ease.

A line-out catch and drive resulted in Kurt Brown crossing, Turner adding the extras, while Roberts-Bailey was quickest to chase down the powerful Hail, who is a professional player with his club, before he could score.

Lewis added another penalty for Hampshire but Gloucestershire were still to hold a half-time advantage with two tries in the closing five minutes of the period to leave Hampshire 29-24 behind.

With his fifth successful kick out of six attempts, Lewis put Hampshire back into contention, but the power in the Gloucestershire scrum was to finally finish Hampshire off.

A spark of hope for Hampshire saw Arnott sin binned and then Jack Parsons, who had replaced Lewis at fly-half, kicked a penalty as the rain started to fall to make it 34-30 with 20 minutes remaining.

However, the sin binning of Portsmouth’s Nick Lynch began the final quarter onslaught, which gave the scoreline its slanted look.

Hampshire manager Ed Neville was proud of his side’s display.

“What a fantastic achievement just to get here,” he said. “This team are an awesome bunch of young men who have done so well.

“We were the better side for the first 15-20 minutes but silly errors saw the game run away from us.”