Norton kicked off this rearranged fixture against third-placed Thornbury with the ground just playable following a week of rain. Thornbury started the game quickly and pressured the home side’s line in the opening minutes, but the defence held firm, depriving the visitors of an early score.
Pressure forced Norton into giving away penalties and this allowed the visitors to kick into the corner, giving them good attacking opportunities and on ten minutes, they managed to drive over to score a converted try.
From the restart, Norton immediately went on the attack with both forwards and backs linking well to make space for Rideout to have a relatively easy run-in to score in the corner.
Thornbury, stung by this score, went straight back on the attack and created space to score an unconverted try wide out. The heavy conditions brought the forwards on both sides to the fore, but neither could get the upper hand in scrum or lineout. Norton’s injury woes continued when scrum half, Dan Moon, had to be replaced by Johnson, who had started the game on the wing.
The visitors scored two more tries in the half, both from driving line outs, one after thirty minutes and the other just on half-time to take the score to 24–5 at the break. The home side were now playing up the slope and took the game to the visitors, with young forward, Goddard, having his best game in the First Team shirt.
Thornbury scored two tries in the last few minutes of the game as the Norton side tired, taking the score to 36–5. This was a gutsy performance and Norton never gave up – with the team looking forward to this Saturday when Kingsbridge visit Norton Down.