Petersfield’s first team returned to winning ways with a 38-20 victory at home to Bournemouth’s second team in Hampshire 1 on Saturday.
Moving to pitch three behind the Taro Centre – the only pitch without standing water – took the match away from the clubhouse and balcony support, although several hardy souls made their way to the windswept touchline to give support to the team.
The opposition were keen to play and were almost the hosts’ equal on the day.
From the restart, Bournemouth took the ball into the hosts’ 22 and Petersfield were penalised for not rolling away from the tackled player for a penalty kick which was cleanly slotted between the uprights.
A further penalty for the same offence gave the visitors a second shot at goal for a further three points.
After Whitear was yellow carded for a tackle on a player without the ball, Bournemouth took a tapped penalty and advanced their score with a converted try to lead 13-7.
Petersfield responded well and Joe Atkinson ripped possession from a visitor to make one of his crashing runs through several desperate attempted Bournemouth tackles to offload to Nick Wilde, who passed to winger Fin Sloan who scored under the posts and converted his own try.
In the remaining minutes of the half Lee Jones was replaced for a blood injury by Lewis McGarr. At half time the score remained 14-13.
Petersfield were awarded a scrum early in the second half. With the try line in sight Field set up a ruck for scrum-half Will Pritchard to pass to Sloan, who barrelled his way through the defence to score an unconverted try in the corner.
Petersfield continued to put pressure on the visitors with excellent disruptive play from Carl Sharrock and decisive lines of running from James Mates and Nick Mann.
Jamie Williams tapped a penalty and passed to an accelerating Atkinson, who charged through four despairing tackles to touch down over the try line. Whitear added the extras.
Atkinson scored again when he smuggled the ball from the back of an excellent rolling maul to touch down in the corner for an unconverted try.
Sloan was yellow carded with less than ten minutes of the match to play, and with Field down to 14 players their defence was unpicked by Bournemouth running up the right wing and being rebuffed five metres out. The ball was recycled to their fly-half, who kicked to his unmarked left winger who touched down for a converted try.
In the final minute of the match Field won lineout ball some 15 metres out and once again set up a maul which rolled forward for their captain Harley Orr to score by the posts. Whitear added the conversion to complete an excellent performance with the boot and make it 38-20.
Petersfield travel to Anstey Park on Saturday for the local derby against Alton, who will hope to avenge the 40-10 drubbing they received at Penns Place in October.
Chris Todd