A sunny, if windy, day greeted Westcombe Park as well as a large number of travelling supporters, who had made the short trip over the channel to Guernsey for the last game of the season.

Those who had arrived early were treated to a 2’s game at 12.30pm, which featured players aged 18 all the way through to 47, including coach Simon Campbell and squad strength and conditioning coach James Leverington. Completing the team were a number of regular 2’s players as well as some faces to have graced the 1’s. The game ended up with a 0-69 win against a Guernsey side made up of their 2’s and some players from other local clubs making up the numbers. This game also featured Niki Davies in his last game before his ‘partial’ retirement, who didn't quite make his hat-trick.

With a brief interlude allowing the travelling support to regroup and sample more of the home clubs hospitality, the 1st team game kicked off at 3pm with Guernsey needing a single point to guarantee safety for this season.

After a competitive but scoreless first 20 minutes, it was Guernsey who broke the deadlock with a try in the corner by their captain Blair Campbell, but in the windy conditions Glen Walters was unable to add the conversion. Guernsey, buoyed by the score, immediately pressured the Combe line, but Tom Gray intercepted an errant pass from the Guernsey scrumhalf and then ran almost the full length of the pitch to score under the posts. Frank Reynolds, sure footed and confident all day, scored the conversion to make it 5-7. This time is was Combe’s turn to lose the ball with a loose pass, and it was Guernsey’s Bailey who ran the try in unopposed. With the conversion this made the game 12-7. Quickly after a penalty to Guernsey from 30 yrds out added another 3 points to their total at which point half time arrived with the score 15-7.

The second half started with Combe having more of the strong wind behind them, and came out of the blocks looking to recover their position. A strong forwards try with James Shepard going over the line, came after 3mins which brought the score to 15-14, after another Reynolds conversion. Here started a very entertaining period of end to end Rugby with each side scoring in turn. First were Guernsey with an unconverted effort by Ned Brown, 20-14. Combe returned with another well worked forwards try, with Dale Bellinger going over the line. Reynolds bettered Guernsey by putting over the conversion to make the score 20-21. After another Guernsey penalty, Combe again piled on the forwards pressure and after driving back Guernsey 25 metres, with Matt Arvier going over the line. Another Reynolds conversion this made the score 23-28.

Unfortunately this is where the Combe scoring petered out, not helped by Dale Bellinger seeing yellow for forgetting to use his arms in a tackle, meaning Combe were down to 14. Guernsey, with results elsewhere not going their way at the time, fired up their backs who calmed their supporter’s nerves with 3 more tries and 2 conversions in the last 15 minutes. This not only kept them safe in the league, but also somewhat flattered the score line at fulltime 42-28.

The loss didn’t seem to diminish the festivities in the Guernsey Club House afterwards where Westcombe Park players and supporters seemed to outnumber the home support two to one.

With results elsewhere in the league surprising many, it was CS Rugby 1863, Amersham and Chiltern and Tring who are relegated, with Westcliff saving themselves with a win over 2nd placed Barnes, 8-7. At the top that loss meant Barnes finish in 2nd place with a playoff next weekend against Exmouth for promotion, and Bury St Edmunds finishing in top stop getting automatically promoted.

Westcombe Park finish the season in respectable 5th place, behind East Grinstead and London Irish Wild Geese, if not quite where we had hoped for after a very strong first half of the season.

The two remaining tasks are to thank the all the players, coaches, managers and back room staff, who have put in an amazing effort throughout the season, and finally to thank all those supporters who braved good weather and bad, cheered or despaired, home or away, to make us the successful club we are.

Westcombe Park: Poole, H. Barton, Sheppard, L. Bellinger, D. Bellinger, Paddick, Covington, Arvier; Gray, Reynolds, Penney, Hough, Hennah, Leeper, Nattrass. Replacements: Conlon, Lewis, Birch.

Match Reporter: Graham Seppings