Sat 10 Jan 2026
Maldon welcomed East London to Drapers Farm, in front of a healthy VPs crowd, on a dry but cold day. Maldon had defeated East London earlier in the season & were hopeful that they could do the double. East London, however, had other ideas &, when the game started, had all the possession & territory. Maldon did not clear their lines well, nor maintain possession when they had it. East London, on the other hand, showed great skills, especially in the contact area, winning turnovers with ease. All this possession resulted in a penalty in front of the post, duly converted, 0-3. Following a tea warning for tackling slightly too high, full-back Sam Langston made a high tackle & received a yellow card. At this point the game went completely to the visitors. A simple missed tackle allowed the East London centre to run through & feed his teammate for a converted try, 0-10. This was closely followed by another try, in which accurate passing & poor tackling saw the score move to 0-17. When this was followed by another try, 0-24, Maldon’s heads were down but some players finally woke up. More aggression in contact & better decisions in terms of passing allowed Maldon to finally have some territory & possession. By keeping the tactics simple and a big pass from prop George Perkins, Maldon were able to move the ball wide to winger Sam Johnson, who cut inside the defenders well to score Maldon’s first try, 5-24. Next came some controversy, as the East London 2nd row was adjudged to have used his head towards a Maldon player & received a red card. Despite this, East London decided that they needed another try to restore the large gap & they achieved this with some simplicity, just before half -time. 5-31.
The second half started with a high tackle by East London, resulting in a yellow card, giving Maldon an advantage of 15 v 13. By using the extra men Maldon were able to find space for captain Lewis Nichols to cross for a try converted by Alfie Summers, 12-31.
Still playing against 13 men, Maldon pushed hard to narrow the gap. But the ball was turned over & East London kicked down the field, chasing hard. Maldon full-back, Sam Langston, obstructed the opposition winger, resulting in a penalty try & a 2nd yellow card for Sam, ending his involvement in the game, 12-38.
For the rest of the game both teams managed to use the space available due to less players on the pitch. East London scored 4 additional tries, a couple of which were due to strong running & poor defence. Maldon scored 2 more tries, another for Sam Johnson & one try (possibly his first 1st team try) for Callum Melville, the highlight of the day for Maldon in what was a day to forget.
The final score of 22-62 was very disappointing & Maldon will need to raise their performances for the remaining games this season.
Man of the match - Kieran Reeve
Next week Maldon travel to Upminster.
