Ashford Barbarians I 10 vs TWRUFC 1st XV 14

6th Dec 2025, KO 14:00

Ashford Barbarians I - Away

Live Text, Match Report & Information

Match Report

Continuing the winning motion !!!

This week saw the boys take on a strong and resilient Ashford Barbarians team away from home. With no team until the Thursday the sheet was filled out by some vets stepping up to the plate, including both Will Cornwell and Mark Noble for their first games in a while. This was accompanied with a full Hopkins clan with all 4, (3) men and Lewis taking to the field for the first time ever. Sam Gunter took the captaincy with some first timer VC’s to support him, Alex Manning commanding the backs, and Guy Williamson and Fin Parfitt taking control of the pack. It was certainly a team which some would look at as a weakened side, but the ash spirit was running high through every jersey and heart on the field and it was game time !

The pitch was in quite a state with there appearing to be a trench through the middle of it and the grounds man not bothering to cut the bushes back in the dead zone of the pitch. Instead of creating the perfect straight line required for a rugby field he decided to take the more artistic and organic approach and just follow the hedge line with his line painting machine !!! In a weird way it felt like home with how grassroots the place felt and how reflective of the way the game should be played it was.

With a nice and relaxed warm up accompanied some apparently better music than usual, personally wouldn’t take the slander Jimmy. A quick change into playing kit and the boys were ready to take the field against an obviously reinforced Baa Baa’s side. Revenge was in need from 3 years earlier and the boys new exactly what their jobs were.

From the start we were away. Hard runs into weak tackles meant a lot of ground was made early on both sides. Scrappy play began early with late hits and after’s happening all over the field right from the word go. The referee it appeared wanted to assert some dominance on the game in these first 10 minutes by halting play to ask our very own Coach Neil to stop shouting at his own players at it was “out of control”. He then chose to have a sit down for 10 minutes before risking a yellow card. This was further backed up by another slip of discipline seeing Phillip Hopkins take to the sin bin for back chat and suddenly the boys were under the cosh with only 14 men?

Baa Baa’s pinned us back and some Questionable ?!?!?! plays in the form of a rogue kick from PROP Dylan Richards, an unneeded roly-poly from Fin Parfitt yet again becoming a habit now ! and a free-willed Dec Quincey giving it large for the photos in front of our own defensive line ! These first 20 minutes felt like a real struggle with us conceding a penalty early. Some quick thinking from the ash boys with frantic pick and go’s, hard running lines through the backs and dominant scrums and rucks allowed for more plays up the field all pushing towards the whitewash. We ended up with a penalty center of the park with Harry Hop opting for the posts and securing the points bringing the score back level. Patience paid off for the boys in the end with another opportunity coming not long after swinging the ball wide to a line up of forwards out wide a smooth ball going through the hands of Bok, Steve Crump and ending up in the breadbasket of skipper Sam Gunter gracefully diving it over the line for the first points on the board for the boys.

The return to 15 men saw yet again more confidence and balance in the game, the boys started to get rolling playing more and more quality rugby all across the field the likes of Conor McGrath putting in try scoring tackles all over the back field, Brad-Lee Nash running it without worry from anywhere. Bokka and Dec putting in huge hits. Unfortunately, we had to see off out new VC Guy Williamson just before the half after he carried a ball so hard into opposition that he hurt himself.

The second half continued much the same, the boys carried the same game plan take points where they were on offer and put up a great fight everywhere else. The second half saw some really good play, and saw a great impact of substitutes making a change like when Mark and Joe came on. Through aggression, power, hunger and fight, we managed to secure 3 opportunities at goal again 2 of which were slotted by Pip. 3-14.

The last quarter was tough, with our weakened and aching bodies, every hit became harder and every challenge more brutal. The Baa Baa’s were fuelled by fresh sets of legs even completely changing their set up with a new set of 9 and 10, but that didn’t stop ash from fighting back. The game got scrappy and many off the ball hits were going in all over the pitch the most notable when they fly kicked young Lewis Hopkins on the floor behind the refs back. However, ash showed their grit by defending on our own 5 meter for about a 10 to 15 minute stint hitting up every time and driving the attack back holding the ball up 3 times during this period of play. Ashford Baa Baa’s winger who was borrowed from Ashford managed to drop the ball out wide with no one in front of him to spoil their chances at the score. Ash then punished these mistakes by clearing our lines and playing u[ in their half again. More scraps happened before the final whistle with that same winger wanting to spear Harry when he was off the pitch (who can blame him) but luckily Shannon was to the rescue, there to shout him down. And Pip yet again as usual found himself in some bother after a big tackle ending in a full 26 man brawl on the pitch which wasn’t needed in any version of that was it Pip !?

The game finished 10-14 with the boys coming away with yet another win. Although it was scrappy and ugly at times the job was done and there was an overwhelming feeling that we had played far better than the week before. And the post match talk was definitely more positive that 7 days prior.

Top work boys onto the next.

MOTM: Phillip Hopkins (voted by them if it was our decision he would have been DOTD)

DOTD: Dylan Richards (top tip – don’t kick it on our own 5 meter as a prop, and don’t ever use the phrase “but it worked” again)

Try Scorers: Sam Gunter

Penalties: Harry Hopkins, Phillip Hopkins (2)

Next week we face Swanley at home and it is the 30th Anniversary celebration. After that we play Snowdown away.

2 more games before Christmas and that’s 2 wins, big efforts from the whole squad for the next couple of weeks and calling all supporters, get down and back the boys for these next up coming fixtures