Watton 10 : 24 Diss 3rds - 17th September 2016

Winger Jo Woods ran in three tries for Diss in a 10-24 away friendly victory over Watton at their new ground and new pitch at Saham Toney. His heroics helped the home side make it two wins in two starts of the season and inflicted a second defeat for the Watton side of the season. Diss began on the front foot and played some superb rugby straight from the kick off and were a try up after 5 minutes when the game came to life due to a powerful run by John Alexander who went over from close range. Diss kept up the momentum and scored again this time by winger Woods who received the ball out wide and raced round his opposite number to score. The attacking play continued with prop Karlton Gray crashing up and Watts and Yager dominated in the lineout. Another try had to come and a cross field kick by James Hayhoe left space out wide for Woods to run onto and claim the ball and race through and score under the posts. Naz Girgin added the extras. Diss now had the ascendency and another score came when Fergus Newman cut an excellent line from a poor Watton clearance and he shimmied through a couple of missed tackles and got tackled just short of the line where he offloaded to the racing past Woods to get his hat trick in 20 minutes of play.

The second half Watton regained some momentum and regularly attacked Diss and this was a chance for Diss to show their defensive skills. Skipper Benny Goodman shut the gates in the centre and Nick Yager was regularly in or around the action. Jack Owen had a tackle count in double figures and with Jordan Dunning coming on at flanker Diss were never short of numbers in the defensive line. Henry Passmore put in a number of tackles at number eight but eventually Watton scored two tries of their own, a lineout and a rolling maul leading to the first try and after a period of pressure another try, slightly fortunate, came late on. Diss had a period of play in the Watton half but couldn’t score to take the game further away from Watton with a missed penalty. The scrums continued to be solid when veteran Owen Atkinson came on to further shut the game out. Back to league action next week when Diss go to Crusaders in what will be another test to the ever improving side.