Heathfield opened their 2006/2007 league season with an emphatic win over Edenbridge (playing in the Sussex Leagues for the first time), in a well fought game on the Cross in Hand pitch.

Heathfield started their scoring with a well-taken try from Ed Koops (his first league try for the club), which was closely followed by a fine individual try from prop Fraser Goatcher.

A further try by No.8 Alex Lester, for the home side ensured that Heathfield still held an 8-point advantage after an Edenbridge try and conversion.

The Heathfield forwards worked extremely well in both the set pieces and the rucks and mauls winning most of the ball to ensure that they continued to press home their advantage.

Good play by scrumhalf Rikki Zeitlin always ensured that Heathfield’s backs kept Edenbridge busy. Inside centre Jack Warren did some darting runs into the opponents half, with good support play coming from Alex Robbins, Owen Lewis and Caspian Kingdon.

Stand-off Oli Stables had a quieter game than normal but still managed to run in four tries, and his intelligent kicking over the Edenbridge backs helped to maintain the home side’s advantage.

Three further tries by Fraser Goatcher brought his tally to 4, the last one coming from a fine solo run by Ed Koops following an Edenbridge kick-off; the 2nd row forward ran from his own 10 metre line well into the opponents 22 before off-loading a fine pass to Fraser Goatcher, who was in close support, and who ran over the line to score.

A try from Caspian Kingdon, outside centre, and conversions from Jack Warren and fullback Freddie Long gave the home team a well-earned result.

11/5/2006 5:17:00 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)