SUPERMARINE made the best of atrocious conditions to beat Blandford 10-8 to win the Dorset & Wilts Senior Vase.

In boggy conditions at North Dorset, it was Blandford who took the lead through a penalty before marine kicker Stu Dawson levelled matters with one of his own to ensure the two sides went into the break locked at 3-3.

After the interval head coach Sean Millwaters, playing at scrum-half, took advantage of a Blandford slip at a scrum on their own five-metre line and pounced to touch down for the try that would ultimately be the winner, and although Blandford scored one of their own they missed their conversion and a subsequent penalty as Marine held on to claim the trophy.

“The pitch was in a state, a complete quagmire, so it was never going to be a day for running rugby although we tried to move the ball when we could,” Millwaters said.

“We won the toss and decided to play into the wind and the message was ‘right boys, we defend and they do not score’ and we turned round at 3-3. We were probably under pressure for most of the half because it was very windy but we did well to keep them out.

“They were pretty route one which was surprising given they had the wind, but they didn’t exploit it because maybe they thought they could smash us out the game. They started to kick it in the second 20 minutes of the second half and had some possession but we kept them quiet.

“Blandford had their best period of possession after we scored our try and they peppered us really hard before their number 10 got over in the corner, before missing the conversion, which meant we had done enough.”

The victory caps a superb start to the season which sees Marine sit third in Dorset & Wilts 1 North, but although Millwaters is proud of the achievement he is hoping it’s just the beginning.

“We felt we deserved this and it’s great to finish the year off with some silverware and now we go into the national competition,” he said. “We are four games from Twickenham or something like that but we can’t even think about that.

“We have a few broken bodies looking forward to a couple of weeks off but we will soon be back to the league against Devizes in January.

“We’ve done really well to be where we are in the league and to have won this, but it’s only a start and we have more to achieve.”