Banbury travelled up to Leicester Forest looking to continue their good run of form, mindful that Forest are always tough to beat on their home ground. Whilst the pack only saw one change from the previous week’s match, the welcome return of Mathew Shepley at prop, the backs were again full of personnel and positional changes.

The match kicked off with Banbury playing down the slope and the very first play set the pattern that was to be repeated throughout much of the game. The ball was caught and cleared by Banbury, but the kick was not great and the Forest back three countered strongly. Some poor Banbury tackling and good offloading by Forest saw the home side threaten but some poor handling at the last prevented them from opening their account inside the first minute. Banbury however were quick to respond and were attacking strongly, recycling the ball well in the Forest 22. Repeated quick phases gave the Bulls the opportunity they needed and Dave Taylor found the gap to score the first try of the game and successfully converted to give the Bulls a 7-0 lead after just 2 minutes.

Strong running from the restart by the back row pair of Simon Brand and captain Sean Bannister saw the Bulls strike again. Quick recycyling in the Forest 22 found a gap on the blindside for flanker Nick Clark to barrel over. Despite Taylor missing the conversion, Banbury had established a 12-0 lead after just 5 minutes.

However, rather than settling into their game Banbury continued to be troubled by the strong running Forest backline. This combined with conceding cheap penalties in good attacking positions contrived to keep the match even, despite the Forest no.6 being yellow carded for repeated infringements at the breakdown by the home side. It was during this period of being one man down that Forest go onto the score board. Again a poor kick by Banbury was run back hard from the halfway line and some good support play saw Forest flanker Tom Vesty go over for a try.

Banbury now only lead 12-5, and things were to get worse for the visitors when another good break by Forest caught the Bulls defence off-side in their own 22. This allowed Forest to kick for goal, and Coulthurst was successful in bringing Forest to within 5 points at 12-8.
The rest of the half ebbed and flowed with both sides looking to attack from deep to establish a platform and the only remaining score saw Taylor kick a penalty goal for a breakdown infringement to give Banbury a 15-8 half-time lead.

Banbury were aware that they had not made the most of their first half and would be up against a home side that now had the slope advantage and would be coming out confident of a coming from behind to take the victory. However it was Banbury who started the second half strongest. With the Forest scrum struggling to cope with the strong Banbury pack, scrum half Eddie Phillips was able to charge down an attempted clearance kick from the Forest fly-half. Reacting quickly he pounced on the loose ball and scampered over for his first try this season. Taylor again supplied the extras and Banbury were now leading 22-8.
Again Forest looked to come back at the visitors through their skilful backs but after a number of attacks were repulsed, Banbury were able to win turnover ball in the middle of their own half. The ball was quickly shipped out wide to young wing Ryan Sorrell who scorched around the cover defence and scored under the posts, giving Taylor an easy conversion and Banbury a 29-8 lead.

Forest knew they had to get the next try to stay in the game. Choosing to kick a penalty to the corner 5 metres from the Banbury line, some good recycling and hard running stretched the visitors’ defence to breaking point and flanker Liam Warren drove over to score. With the conversion the score was now 29-15 and Forest had their tails up.
Taylor was able to extend Banbury’s lead to 32-15 with a long range penalty but an excellent attack from a lineout on half way saw Karl Wesley break through some weak tackling for a try to make the score 32-20. Further poor kicking by Banbury continued to give good counter-attacking opportunities to Forest and after a flowing move down the right wing Cameron Steel brought Forest to within one score at 32-25 with 15 minutes remaining.

Banbury now realised they were in danger of letting the game slip away and changed tactics. Taking on the Forest forwards, the Bulls pack demonstrated some excellent driving close to the breakdown which sucked in the home defence. Sensing an overlap the ball came back against the grain from Phillips and some good hands from backs and forwards saw winger Jed Boyle go over in the corner for a deserved try to put Banbury 37-25 ahead, effectively sealing the win.

With only a few minutes remaining Banbury were able to run the clock down and when a last burst attack was snuffed out the Bulls came out victorious, and found themselves topping the league. Man of the match for Banbury was Sean Bannister who led his team by example throughout the hard-fought game.

Banbury take a break from league action as they travel to Rugby to take on Old Laurentians in the Intermediate Cup, kick-off at 2:30pm.