Director of rugby Jordan Reynolds revealed after their hard-fought and ultimately nail-biting victory over Sevenoaks that for co-captain Lewis Hillier, record appearance-maker Tom Ceillam and their fellow long-standing Siam Cup winner Owen Thomas this would be their last home game for Raiders and it was a fitting way for them to say goodbye in front of another big Garenne Stand crowd.
‘We’re really happy to finish our last home game of the league season [with a win] and you’ve got to remember for a lot of players out there, that’s their last game,’ Reynolds said.
‘We know Lou’s retiring, so that’s his last home game for the shirt, Rae-Rae [Ceillam] said he’s going to retire after this season, Owen’s finishing up, so it’s good to finish on a win for those boys as well.’
Watch the tries from Footes Lane
Sevenoaks very nearly put a fly in the ointment in dramatic fashion in the dying seconds of the game, though.
It looked as if Raiders were home and dry when, moments after a brilliant piece of defensive work in the tackle by Anthony Armstrong to turn over the ball for his side on halfway, the winger then chased his own chip ahead to win a line-out 5m out with just a couple of minutes remaining.
However, there was still a plot twist or two to come.
The refereee adjudged the subsequent throw to be not straight and from the scrum deep inside their own 22, Sevenoaks gave the ball to impressive centre Sam Begbie and he exploited a small gap to make an explosive break upfield.
Charlie Simmonds managed to halt his progress on halfway, but Begbie offloaded out of the tackle to Brayden Porteous before regaining his feet to offer his support to his No 8 once again.
The crowd could sense heartbreak for Raiders, but much to their relief the return pass from Porteous to Begbie was, understandably, a tired one and the ball was lost forward to an almighty cheer.
Had Sevenoaks not let that golden chance slip by, defeat would have been extremely harsh on Raiders who should have been more convincing winners on a day when their rugby ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous at times.
They were excellent for long patches of the first half, including for the vast majority of the opening quarter yet somehow they found themselves trailing by two points after 25 minutes.
The home side butchered a couple of great opportunities in the first five minutes before Josh Poullet powered over to give them the lead in the seventh minute with Simmonds adding the extras.
Raiders continued to dominate but one loose pass cost them seven points with Brennan O’Keefe first to react and collecting his own hack on to score.
A sumptuous backs move finished off by Simmonds briefly put Guernsey 12-7 ahead, but then Sevenoaks benefitted from a large slice of good fortune as their own misplaced pass ricocheted off the legs of one of their forwards and scrum-half Ethan Jones gathered to score with the Raiders defence wrong-footed.
The hosts did not let their heads drop, though.
Instead they pressurised the visitors into giving away a series of penalties, which led to Oliver Green being sin-binned for pulling down a maul after a team warning, and Jack Colbourne scored while advantage was being played for that offence.
Ben Adams slotted over a penalty that drew Sevenoaks level five minutes before half-time, but Raiders deservedly went into the interval with a seven-point lead.
The forwards did much of the hard work for the bonus-point try with Brad Webb’s fine grab at a line-out followed by powerful runs from Poullet and Carter Hackett before Dale Rutledge picked up at the base of a ruck and dived over under the posts.
The second half did not reach the levels of the first as 11 successive matches took their toll on Raiders and the game became very stop-start.
It took 18 minutes for either side to add to their tally and it was Sevenoaks who reduced their deficit with O’Keefe getting his second try from Zachary Shirtcliff’s fizzing pass.
Raiders responded with Ciaran McGann kicking three points from a close-range penalty, but a minute later they were trailing for the second time as a Sevenoaks counter-ruck allowed an alert Harry Martin to pick up the exposed ball and accelerate to the line from just a few metres out.
But the home side managed to summon the energy to come up with another quick response.
Having won another penalty close to the Sevenoaks line, Hillier this time opted for the scrum and the forwards did their job at the set-piece, earning a penalty advantage, which allowed Thomas to attack the defensive line and ghost through it to score.
It proved to be decisive, despite the late scare.
You need to be logged in to comment. If you had an account on our previous site, you can migrate your old account and comment profile to this site by visiting this page and entering the email address for your old account. We'll then send you an email with a link to follow to complete the process.