London South Africa re-find form with commanding victory.........

Saturday 8th December

By Matt Aristizabal

With the Wimbledon Surrey Cup game postponed a combined LSA XV took on Basingstoke in the Canterbury Shield. Gareth Williams opened the home side’s account on five minutes, and four minutes later LSA raced into a 12-0 lead when Williams converted Malcolm Mirfin’s first try of three. Trevor Grundelingh weighed in with his first on 18 minutes, and whilst only being 17 points up LSA had full control of the game. Hugo Baldwin ensured that there was no coming back for Basingstoke with a try in the 28th minute, and Ben Bougas began his own unanswered scoring spree on the half hour with a try and conversion. Bougas then completed the half’s scoring with his second in the 37th minute as the exiles went in at the break with a totally dominant 34-0 lead.

Bougas started where he left off almost at the whistle when he completed his hat-trick in the first minute in the half, and not to be left out Grundelingh got his pair to make it 44-0 three minutes later. Mirfin had re-discovered his taste for scoring with the conversion, and promptly got his second in the 12thminute of the half. At 51-0 LSA were able to take their foot off the gas, but an uncharacteristic lull in the scoring was soon ended as Tiaan Visser’s converted try stretched the lead to 58-0. Mirfin finished off his hat-trick, and his side’s scoring, in the 69th minute but the action wasn’t over as Basingstoke managed to score and convert with a minute to go to ensure that there wasn’t a whitewash as the game finished 63-7.

Head Coach Bob Crooks was very pleased with his side’s return to form: “We played really well, played our own game and showed good ball skills - like we did at the start of the season.” With such a good performance, an individual was hard to pick out but Crooks singled out Trevor Grundelingh for the KWV Wines man-of-the-match award: “Trevor was the conduit that allowed those outside him to score - he showed excellent skills and was always a threat to the opposition.”

Next week sees LSA play their final league game this year on their home ground against Old Pauline, the team looking to go into the mid-season break on a high.