RUGBY: Thetford travelled to Mistley for the third week of their Eastern Counties Two campaign still looking for that elusive win, following a much improved display against Hadleigh.

Captain Ollie Taylor said: “Coming away to second in the league was always going to be tough, we’re a little low on confidence.

“But it was our discipline that cost us. We’ll take the positives away from the game and get the season on track at home in the cup at the weekend.”

Thetford will gather themselves to play Broadland in the Junior Vase at home, 3pm kick-off on Saturday.

Mistley 49, Thetford 14

Thetford arrived intent on making their mark on the league, and set their stall out with Martin Sands making a huge tackle from the kick-off.

This set the precedent for the first half with Tony Watson slotting over a drop goal. With big hits being put in across the midfield with captain Ollie Taylor burying the Mistley centre.

With no progress being made by Mistley through the middle a well worked backs move led to the Mistley’s full-back scoring out wide.

Thetford rallied and camped in the Mistley 22, big carries from the Thetford pack forced errors from Mistley, the resulting penalty cooly slotted by Watson.

Thetford, trying to play all the rugby, started to make errors with Mistley punishing the errors with a converted try.

An interception on the Thetford 10m line led to the Mistley number eight scoring under the posts before the half came to a close with the score 19-6.

Thetford came out after the interval with an aggressive edge, but soon turned the referee against them with persistent ill discipline, and backchat after becoming frustrated by a street-wise Mistley pack.

Suffering a succession of penalties, punished by a series of tries and penalties.

Watson continued with his impressive kicking game putting Thetford into the right areas to use their dominant rolling maul.

Another fantastic maul sucked in the Mistley defence for Dexter’s Man of the Match Richard Sharp to box kick into space, with a solid chase from debutant Simon Jones pressured the full-back, allowing Sharp to gather and score.

Thetford’s lack of discipline in defence allowed a further score leaving the result 49-14.

Anyone interested in playing rugby should contact Ollie Taylor on 07947 442936.