Dorchester travelled to high flying Frome in this Southern Counties one fixture. Although missing a couple of key players through late cry offs and injury, the county town side fielded a strong side, which has not always been the case on the road this season.
After last weeks post mortem and some spirited training sessions during the week, Dorchester started the game in positive fashion. The first two scrums of the game found the visitors driving the home team backwards, which boosted their confidence. Dorchester were also winning their own ball in the lineout, but were often repelled by the home sides strong defence. Frome managed to frustrate Dorchester at the breakdown, some of the time illegally, resulting in the match referee speaking to the hosts captain on a number of occasions.
With both sides being prepared to run the ball, the first quarter of the match was producing some good attractive rugby the difference perhaps between the two sides was Frome's superior kicking game that frequently tested Dorchester's back three and enabled Frome to gain good field position in which they could play to their strengths.
Frome's first try came from a good kick downfield, followed by a catch and drive from the lineout. To Dorchester's credit their defence contested aggressively and held up Frome a number of times before the hosts finally breached the line.
Unfortunately for Dorchester, the flood gates opened, as Frome started to execute their game plan with ruthless efficiency, with a number of incisive breaks and strong running from depth. This was not helped by some typically weak tackling from the visitors. Frome ran in three more tries to lead comfortably at half time.
As demonstrated in previous weeks, with the game already lost Dorchester started to play some rugby, playing most of the half within Frome territory. Unfortunately some particularly fussy refereeing spoiled a number of chances that Dorchester had to add points to the scoreboard. This did little for Dorchester's confidence, but to their credit they battled manfully up front to try and gain some parity with Frome's well organised pack. Particularly impressive were prop Steve Hodgson, number eight and captain Rich Bament and scrum half Luke Weller, who belied his age with a really strong display.
Time once again ran out for Dorchester, as Frome managed to close the game out and take the points. Dorchester have now failed to score any tries in their last three league games, with all their points coming frome the boot of John Firkin.
Chris Burton's men must continue to dig in and work hard starting with their home fixture next week against Wimborne.
