Maidstone 18 Tottonians 37

Tottonians made sure Kent clubs will not get it all their own way as they produced a top performance and bonus point victory at Maidstone.

Totts were beaten by Tunbridge Wells on their own turf just over a week ago – and face Sevenoaks at home on Saturday - but the long journey to the south east of England last weekend was well worth it after they returned with a 37-18 win.

The home side took the lead with a 12th-minute try, but Totts were not behind for long, writes Clive Downton.

Mike Searle found fellow back Richard Buck who raced over to make the conversion a formality for Robbie Searle.

The fly-half then added the extras to Tottonians’ second try which came just two minutes later, fullback Tom Foster sprinting 40 metres and offloading to scorer Nick Jones as he was tackled on the line.

Back came Maidstone with another try but two Totts’ penalties gave them a deserved 20-10 half-time advantage.

Buck spent five minutes on the sidelines either side of the break after being yellow carded and Maidstone, whose No 8 was also sin binned early in the half, inched closer to their opponents with a penalty.

Another break by Buck and Robbie Searle came to a halt on the Maidstone five-metre line where Totts’ forwards continued the onslaught. Nathan Burns was stopped just short of the whitewash before Tom Gregory squeezed over in the corner. Robbie Searle again made the difficult conversion.

Back came battling Maidstone to bring up 18 points but they never bothered the scoreboard again as Totts pulled away – Nick Jones securing the bonus point with his second before captain Robbie Searle added five more points with his boot.

Buck was named Totts’ man of the match but coach Gavin Williams heaped praise on all 18 players, including second row Ollie King who has moved up from the colts and more experienced players who took on new roles, Tom Gregory at hooker and Joe Searle at Number 8.

Williams said: “It was a complete team performance. Our work at the set piece and breakdown was excellent and our defence was pretty good.

“To be honest the points they scored were gifted to them. That’s something we have to remove from our game but everything else was positive.”

He added: “Every game is a tough one in this league as we found out last week and if you are not 100 per cent on top of your game you will come a cropper but if we perform as we can consistently we will do alright.”

Totts moved up to fourth, ahead of Havant who were beaten 27-13 at leaders Tunbridge Wells. Gosport lost their fourth London 1 game on the bounce but gave a better account of themselves at home to Gravesend, fighting back from 25-0 down to lose 32-19.