Luke Jarmyn reports…
“PERFECTION” is how Jersey RFC fly-half Aaron Penberthy aptly described Jersey RFC’s victory over former National League outfit Worthing Raiders on Saturday, as his side produced a scintillating nine-try victory.
Myles Landick’s side seemed to find the Midas touch in a stand out 20 minutes before half-time, which was mesmeric to witness as they sealed a statement 13th win in a row this season.
Openside flanker Euan Spencer grabbed a hat-trick in a man of the match showing, while Penberthy came back from a peculiar yellow card to barely put a foot wrong and score all eight conversions he kicked while crossing the whitewash twice.
The ex-Ealing and Cornish Pirates playmaker said: “It felt like we found perfection out there, which feels really good – everything just clicked.
“It’s hard to find perfection in rugby, it is something we all strive for and very rarely get, but when it happens like it did then for 20 or so minutes it is just fantastic and it makes all the hard work look easy.”
Worthing RFC – 19
Tries: Charlie Spencer 7’, Regin Pratt 17’, Ed Hartley 61’
Conversions: Tom Sanderson 18’, 62’
Jersey RFC – 61
Tries: Aaron Penberthy 3’, 51’, Dylan Stocks 11’, Euan Spencer 25’, 28’, 33’, Scott van Breda 36’, Huw Owen 73’, Joe Munns 76’
Conversions: Aaron Penberthy 4’, 26’, 29’, 34’, 37’, 52’, 74’, 77’
Referee: Rob Hitch (RFU)
Attendance: 405
Half-time: 12 – 40 (to Jersey RFC)
JEP star players: Regin Pratt (Worthing) / Euan Spencer (Jersey)
The island-side were greeted with a sun-drenched Roundstone Lane ground as they arrived at mid-day for their final fixture of 2025, and with arguably December’s best weather over the Sussex ground, Penberthy kicked off towards the Southern end.
Within barely three minutes the islanders got the first chalk on the scoreboard. The all-red kitted side capitalised on a Worthing line-out error before a scrum and their own line-out put the visitors by the try-line down the right when inside-centre Scott van Breda found Penberthy in space and the 33-year-old cut a line between the home-side’s centres to slide over between the sticks.
The navy-clad Raiders came straight back, fullback Charlie Spencer dashed down the left, before a chip-and-chase and a few more phases, the No.15 on his 50th Worthing appearance popped back up to dive over.
Another Worthing loss at their own line-out put Jersey captain Evan Whitson and co just yards from the try-line with outside-centre Dylan Stocks finding the break to dash over the whitewash. Unusually Stocks went to convert his own try, but the kick sailed wide.
On the quarter-hour mark Jersey found themselves a man down, Penberthy yellow carded for not attempting to catch the ball; an unusual sin-binning later questioned by Myles Landick.
It put Worthing on the front foot, and after getting their line-out finally working, Raiders went left to right with tighthead prop Regin Pratt muscling over by the right post to score a try in his final game before joining professional outfit Western Force in his native Australia.
Scrum-half Tom Sanderson converted to make it 12-12 after 18 minutes, but any hopes by the South Coast side of an upset were quickly quashed.
Worthing debut winger Jared Penfold came close to flying over down the right, but for Jersey’s tracking back, and then the pendulum swung. Bevan Biggs’ charge down earned a line-out 25 metres out, and after several close-range phases Euan Spencer bundled over with Whitson’s support.
Jersey looked far more comfortable after that, and with a full complement ensured it became a one-sided affair.
On the cusp of the half-hour mark, some great breakdown work by the forwards led to Spencer dotting down on the left for the all-important bonus-point try, and a few minutes later as play got scrappy the financial advisor picked up the loose ball to run 30 metres and score by the right post.
The backs injected some joie de vivre into the fixture, with fullback Mark Boarer carving through the navy-and-yellow line and linked up with No.8 Tim Grey before van Breda sprinted through 35 metres to score in the far-left corner.
The second-half was initially stop-start with Worthing’s set-piece failing and both their replacement Sam Cook – who had come on after lock Matt Bosworth suffered a left-arm injury – and Jersey’s Max Ayling were sin-binned for an altercation on the 43rd minute.
Scott van Breda produced an outrageous 40 metre pin-point cross-field kick for Penberthy, who weaved past the last man to score his second try.
An impressive break against the run of play saw Penfold slip through Jersey’s red line down the left with inside-centre Ed Hartley dashing across to the posts for the home-side’s third try just after the hour-mark.
As the clocked ticked down, Jersey made their final substitutes before the forwards showed their imperiousness once more. Loosehead Huw Owen capped of a fine personal performance by finding himself at the bottom of a bundle to score by the left upright while replacement Joe Munns dived over from a similar line-out move.
Raiders fought back in the final two minutes, but Jersey’s defence and a handling error ensured it was a clean sweep for the islanders.
Teams
Worthing RFC: [15-9] Charlie Spencer (Josh Taylor 20’), Jared Penfold, Christian Streater, Ed Hartley, Will Beer, Tom Meyer, Tom Sanderson; [1-8] Struan Robertson, Max Ravaudet (Alex Havers 52’), Regin Pratt, Ollie Crow, Matt Bosworth (Sam Cook 34’), Jack Lake (C), Luke Gill, Dan Wallis Downham
Sin-bin: Sam Cook 43’
Jersey RFC: [15-9] Mark Boarer, Bevan Biggs, Dylan Stocks, Scott van Breda, Lance Armstrong, Aaron Penberthy, Liam Rhodes; [1-8] Huw Owen, Jack Macfarlane, Jack Higgins (Tom Wilson 59’), Morgan Brady, Max Ayling, Evan Whitson (C) (Joe Ridgway 55’), Euan Spencer (Joe Munns 62’), Tim Grey
Sin-bin: Aaron Penberthy 15’, Max Ayling 43’
Reaction
AFTER watching his Jersey RFC side produce a near-perfect performance on Saturday to round out 2025 in fine style, Myles Landick remains cool on what the future has in store for his table topping team.
The St Peter’s-based side showed the eye-catching all-court rugby they know they’re capable of to beat Worthing Raiders 61-19, and give their fans plenty to celebrate over the festive break with the team sitting pretty at the helm of Regional 1 South Central.
With Jersey extending their unbeaten run this season to 13 league games, it means they’ve pulled 12 points clear of second-top Tunbridge Wells, and continue to have the best record across the RFU’s six tier-five regional leagues as they look to gain promotion to the national leagues.
Cutting a relaxed figure afterwards, Landick highlighted “all the unseen hard work” that has gone into his team’s exceptional position ahead of Christmas.
He told the JEP: “I’m really pleased, and we talk about the tries but I’m particularly happy with our defensive efforts. At times Worthing were banging on the door, but we held firm.
“Most teams know us by now, we love to target the set-piece, and winning a scrum penalty in your own 22-metre area is the difference between playing deep in front of your own try line or playing 60 metres down the other end of the field, and that weapon crucially put us in the right areas to win.
“It’s a great position we’re in as Christmas comes, but I’ve always said we take each game as it comes, we don’t look too far ahead, and that’s what we’ll be doing in the New Year as well.
“To have the lead we’ve now got is nice, but it is a credit to everyone who’s involved, the players, medical group, everyone who coaches, everyone who works hard behind the scenes to allow our team to put in performances like we’ve just seen. It’s been a great year.”
While the reds unbeaten league run stretches back to last season, totalling 15 games since they last tasted a competitive defeat at Maidenhead in March that was critical to falling short in the race for the 2024/5 title, Landick states that “results don’t tell the full story”.
He said: “Just in this fixture alone, we had to have five props on the field at one point, because it isn’t straightforward that we’ll have the 15 we want at any time. But it’s a squad game and it shows how good the boys are at problem solving.
“We spoke about what we would do when having that many props on the park, scrum, scrum, scrum, but seriously we’ve had to make so many chops and changes, but the guys have adapted so well.
“And that’s not just for this fixture, it’s been all year. Joe Munns came off the bench and scored a try, Matt West this season is another example, and everyone that’s come into the team at some point this season has been great and that’s what we need. To win this league, you need 40 to 45 blokes, not 20, and gives us lots to be pleased about.”
While Jersey RFC exude the mindset and focus of a professional outfit playing at a bespoke facility by Jersey Airport, the reality remains that the team is an amateur one with everyone balancing their rugby around other commitments, which Myles labels “natural rotation”.
As he explains: “Our situation is part and parcel of being an amateur squad, we always have three or four guys unavailable on different weekends due to personal commitments and that’s fine.
“But we’ve worked hard on growing the squad depth, we’ve had five second team games as well, as a club we have to be pleased with the year we’ve had, and nothing will change in 2026.”
Openside flanker Euan Spencer scored three tries in a man of the match performance, and said: “It went really well, the lads put in a really good performance especially when considering that we had a few guys unavailable so we had to adjust and by the final whistle we had five props on the park.
“We did well given that to keep our foot on the gas, keep in front and at the end we showed some good defensive work to keep Worthing from scoring a fourth bonus-point try, so a really positive day and a great way to end the calendar year.
“To sit where we do for Christmas is a lovely feeling. We narrowly missed out on promotion last season but that’s been our goal, right from pre-season, all the lads said we’ve beaten all the teams before, it’s just a case of doing it consistently.
“This is exactly the type of occasion to do it when its deepest dark December, away trip, right before Christmas, it is really easy to take your foot off the gas but everyone turned up today, we got over those selection hurdles and we dug in together as a side to sign off with a great victory.”
