Fresh off an eight-try victory over Taunton Titans last weekend, Albion travel to Hertfordshire on Saturday afternoon to face off against Bishop’s Stortford.
Seven points from the first two games, including two highly respectable ones at Rosslyn Park, have made for a positive start to the 2023-24 campaign, and we will look to continue our forward momentum at Stortford on Saturday.
We face off against a Stortford side that have more than played their part in two exciting, close encounters in their opening two games of the season.
They narrowly lost out to Cinderford at home on the opening day, before defeating Blackheath by four points on the road last weekend.
Generally, National League 1 has given us some high scores over the course of the opening two rounds of action, and having scored the highest number of points of anyone against the Titans at the Brickfields, it would be prudent to anticipate another hotly-contested encounter at Silver Leys.
Though the league table is worth barely a glance at this early stage of the season, we are level on points with Stortford coming into this weekend, and ahead on points difference, bolstering the expectation of a battle in round three.
Last Season’s Meetings:
Two entertaining encounters with Stortford last season ultimately saw this weekend’s opponents come away with the win on both occasions, so we’ll be looking to tilt the record in our favour on Saturday!
Team News:
Tom Cowan-Dickie comes in for his first start of the season at Hooker as Harry Wilkinson goes from the replacement pool, while Dan Pullinger comes back in at Tighthead prop. Angus Hodges moves into the second row alongside Dan Collier.
Jake Bond gets his first start at Six, with Torin Clarke keeping his place as the other Flanker. The back row is almost identical to last week but, after Billy Orchard took a knock to the knee against Taunton, Seta Raumakita – re-joining the squad this weekend – heads to right wing.
Craig Duncan is also back in the match day squad; he’ll go from the bench on Saturday.
The team in full:
- Ramaz Rukhadze
- Tom Cowan-Dickie
- Dan Pullinger
- Angus Hodges
- Dan Collier
- Jake Bond
- Torin Clarke
- Sam Daly
- Jack Oulton
- Phil Jones
- Pita Ratukadreu
- Archie Hill
- Sonny Hirini
- Seta Raumakita
- Tom Putt
Replacements:
- Harry Wilkinson
- Jenson Boughton
- Brad Howe
- Morgan Stone
- Craig Duncan
