And so it was that our illustrious first XV made the trek north-west along the A2 to take on the
Gillingham Anchorians for our club’s tenth game of the season. Yet despite having sustained a run of five
consecutive victories, there was an air of nervousness about the squad that was palpable, perhaps
understandably given that several of this seasons’s starting squad were away at the nuptials of one of
our club sponsors. In addition, the changes to the line-up resulted in several players being required to
play outside of their normal position. However, and as you will read, the plucky replacements gave their
all, and emerged triumphant.

Whimsical notions of love and romance may have somewhat clouded the minds of our heroes as they
warmed up prior to the game, and it fell to our esteemed forwards coach to beast them into the correct
mindset for taking on the Anchorians, whose mid-table position masks some decent wins this season.
As many readers will know, the run-up to Christmas is a very busy and pressured time for the forwards
coach in his day job running the gold and diamond mining operation under the mountain at Erebor and
this may explain his volcanic outbursts during the training session that preceded the game. He was
certainly in no mood to tolerate underperformance, and a light-hearted request from one of the
forwards to borrow the Arkenstone for a fancy dress costume was met with a withering stare that made
the blood run cold.

Having respectfully observed two minute’s silence in thoughtful reflection on the service and sacrifice of
our armed forces, the game began. And painful it was to watch, at least for the first twenty minutes
during which Dover simply could not get out of their half. The first three minutes of the game (which
was delayed as a result of the referee’s somewhat laissez-faire approach to timekeeping) saw Dover
concede two penalties, putting them under considerable pressure, and it was only thanks to some very
determined defensive work that the score remained nil-nil. Coleman, playing at 6, took a nasty knock to
the eye and was substituted, although thankfully his magnificent beard remained intact and did not
require any remedial hairspray or other treatment from Dr Rodgers. Beards, or attempts at them, and
moustaches, or attempts at them, were a notable feature of all the Dover squad in their noble support
of Movember (please give your support at https://uk.movember.com/mospace/1408331 ) and there
were some outstanding efforts. Beaumont, with his heartfelt and moving facial tribute to male porn
stars from the late 1970s, and G.Sayers, who in an Errol Flynn Lookalike Competition would have surely
beaten Errol Flynn into a distant second place, were perhaps the highlights.

Coleman’s injury saw young Murphy take the field. Much is expected in the future of this very powerful
young man, whose ability to take – and more importantly, inflict – massive hits are remarkable for an 18
year old. Even more remarkable today was his forgetting to bring any rugby boots to a game of rugby, which saw him obliged to squeeze his size 11 feet into a pair of borrowed size 10 boots. He will hopefully
long remember the resulting blisters.

Unfortunately, the conceding of penalties by Dover continued, with the Anchorians taking the
opportunity to successfully kick for points after some 10 minutes of play. Further frustration was
provided by the weakness of Dover’s lineout, although this must be balanced by the quality of our
scrummaging, with the first half front row of Baker, Russell and Piddlesden doing an excellent job. In fact
the Dover pack was consistently good throughout against an Anchorians pack that has earned a
formidable reputation this season.

The tension arising from Dover’s errors was partly relieved by yet another excellent try by the Welsh
Wizard, Price, who playing at 13 stormed through the opposition defence to put five points on the board
28 minutes into the game, but the Anchorians quickly recovered to score a worthy try of their own
shortly afterwards, which they converted, and the first half ended with the score at 10:5 in their favour.
Thus it was that Dover’s captain took the opportunity to inspire his warriors, as all great leaders must
do. It was a stirring sight. Taking his own inspiration somewhat divinely, he quoted to our assembled
heroes from the Gospel According to St Piddsy, chapter 3, verses 6 - 9. From where the spectators were
standing he resembled an Old Testament Prophet, long hair and beard streaming in the breeze, and his
powerful voice carrying across the field as he quoted from scripture – ‘And lo, an angel of the Lord did
sayeth unto them, you’re second best this first half to a shower of shite! Verily, thou must uppeth thou
game big time. Smite them in the second half! Smite them big time!’. Clearly the many hours our captain
spent at Sunday school as a youth have finally paid dividends.

Duly admonished yet also encouraged, our boys returned to the fray with renewed vigour, assisted by
the arrival on the field of that legendary warhorse, Swinbourne, who despite playing with busted ribs
once again brought his inimitable brand of power and energy to the forwards. Although Dover conceded
another penalty (the referee was rather zealous in his interpretation of the offside rule) which took the
score to 13:5, the tone of the game changed. Twelve minutes into the second half saw Beaumont at 12
scoring a superb try, which was rapidly followed 5 minutes later by another try from Price which was
competently converted by Carpenter. With the score now at 17:13 in Dover’s favour, the Anchorians
crumbled.

The subsequent pressure from Dover was relentless. A superb run from G. Sayers at 9 led to Beaumont
passing to Dover’s favourite South African, Dylan Gardener at 8, who put the ball down behind the posts
leading to another conversion from Carpenter. Gardener is fast becoming a legend at Dover, and his
ability to force opposing teams to commit at least three players to bring him down creates space and
scoring opportunities. The relief of Mafeking during the Boer War would have been considerably more
difficult had Gardener been involved, and we’re very glad he’s on our side.
With the score at 24:13 to Dover the game ended, and with both the players and their supporters
generally pleased at a performance that, whilst leaving areas to work on, did serve to demonstrate both
the team’s gutsy willingness to dig deep when under pressure and the encouraging depth of our current senior squad of players. We look forward to the next game, which is at home on the 26th November when we play Hastings and Bexhill.