The game started badly for Saints when Sandown and Shanklin created an immediate overlap down the left from the kick off. As the Hurricanes' winger went round James Parks and dived for the try, Saints scrum half Ward made a last ditch tackle which did just enough to dislodge the ball as the winger grounded it. A lucky reprieve for the home side, who now needed to clear their lines and regroup. Despite dominating rival packs over the past few weeks, the Saints scrum now came under huge pressure causing the ball to pop out the side. Sandown were first to react to it though, with their flanker picking up and driving over under the posts for an early lead. The conversion was missed, but the visitors had an early five-nil lead.

With the islanders looking to assert themselves and threatening to add to the scoreboard, Saints suddenly remembered how to play as a team. When a Sandown attack was turned over, Saints decided to run it out and strung together phase after phase of solid rucking. All of a sudden, it was a different game...

Saints now looked dangerous going forward and were attacking with numbers. But on a windy day and without key jumpers, the line-out struggled and with the S&S front jumper stealing throw after throw against the head, it was difficult for Saints to set up a solid attacking platform. Meanwhile Sandown cleverly used their big back row to create a solid platform from the scrum. But despite this, Saints stuck to their task and apart from a single penalty to take the score to eight-nil, contained Sandown and Shanklin for the rest of the first half.

With the wind at their backs, Saints now dominated both territory and possession and they took advantage of this when Pierre added two penalties for infringements by S&S at the ruck. The scoreboard narrowed to 6-8 and all the pressure was coming from Saints, but despite this the home side couldn't find a way through the visitors' defence. After a series of good forward drives set up a ruck on the Sandown 22, Pierre stepped back into the pocket and lined up a drop goal attempt, which narrowly drifted left. This was a turning point in the game though, as Sandown and Shanklin suddenly seemed to realise how vulnerable their lead could become.

A crashing drive then took a Sandown maul over the Saints line, but Pierre got underneath it and held the ball up. Sandown took the next chance to add a 3-point penalty which stretched the lead to 6-11, but with only minutes left on the clock, they turned the screw even more by adding a late try following a catch and drive from a line out. The conversion was missed, but that took the score to 6-16 with only minutes remaining. Saints refused to give up and defended their line solidly as Sandown looked to kill off the game, but it took a slice of luck for the last try, which came right at the death. Under pressure on their own 5 yard line, the ball was spun back to Daryl Bray who stepped in at stand-off, but his clearence kick was charged down by an onrushing Sandown player, gifting his team mate a soft try. The conversion went over, taking the final score to 6-23.