Abbey Women’s secured an away victory over Blackheath Women with prop Jess Potter and winger Olivia Grane spearheading an impressive performance.
The cohesive team performance moves them up to sixth position in Championship South 1.
Blackheath started the brighter team, with their useful forwards Sue Neuman and Vanessa Adok challenging Abbey’s half early on.
The physicality of the game was set from the off and huge tackles were made by prop Hannah Gale and second-row Kath Sheppard to keep the home side at bay, before fly-half Annette Bevan jackled well to relieve the pressure.
Intelligent kicking for touch up the pitch by the multitude of Abbey kickers, Alice Denton-Rice, Lou Pullan and Mia McCreesh ensured Abbey responded well, combined with box-kicking from scrum-half Ellie Denton-Rice.
Before long, Abbey found themselves in an excellent position in their opponent’s 22.
A solid scrum ensured clean ball for the backs, and a move straight off the training park released winger Grane, who stretched her legs and finished well.
Buoyed by the early score, a sense of belief swept amongst the squad, and the next exchanges continued to be in Abbey’s favour.
Line breaks from back row pairing Abi Wall and Tori Kiff, as well as centres Denton-Rice and McCreesh, kept Blackheath on the back foot.
Abbey adapted well to positional changes by Blackheath, kicking away from their threatening winger Lyndsay Whitley, as well as containing the ever-dangerous Neumann, and it wasn’t long before Grane grabbed her second, with a scintillating 70m run, escaping the tackles of five defenders as she did so.
Moments later, McCreesh and winger Caroline Shephard combined well in defence to allow McCreesh to dribble the ball 40m and dive down over the line, with Denton-Rice adding the extras.
It was Blackheath who would have the final say of the half, however, as Abbey’s discipline slipped momentarily with a series of team infringements, resulting in skipper Annabel Hawkins seeing yellow, and Neumann crashing over from a close-range penalty.
The second half also started much like the first finished, with a series of penalties conceded by Abbey allowing Blackheath to dot down for their second of the day.
It was after Alice Denton-Rice was shown an unfortunate yellow for a deliberate knock-on that the visitors pulled together to close out the game.
By this time, the Abbey bench had come into play with centre Kelsea Montgomery making an immediate impact with some storming runs and her trademark hand-offs.
With Hawkins back on the pitch, she made amends for her yellow to release the fresh legs of Fern Edgar and Pippa Robinson, and Abbey threatened Blackheath’s try line once more.
After quick play from Joey Fowler, the forward pack continued to press towards the line, allowing Bevan to swing the play back round to Montgomery, who crossed with ease, securing the bonus-point.
Moments later, fullback Pullan took a quick tap from a penalty to round off proceedings for her team.
Tries: Grane (2), McCreesh, Montgomery, Pullan
Conversion: A. Denton-Rice
