L&Y knew they were in for a hard game against the early pacesetters, but were guilty of paying them too much respect early on and ultimately giving themselves too much of a mountain to climb.

Four Basildon tries in the first half and a monopoly of possession for the first 30 minutes won the game and by the time L&Y realised they were just as competent it was too late, despite scoring four tries of their own.

L&Y were immediately on the back foot as the referee missed a knock-on and Basildon hacked through and won the race to touch down. Then, from a scrum 10 metres out, Basildon's No 8 went over for a second score.

L&Y hit straight back, winning a five metre scrum from which Scott Nelson was able to send Myles McAlone over with a neat switch move.

L&Y lost flanker Steve Powles to the sinbin and almost immediately conceded a try when the Basildon centre cut back through some weak covering defence. L&Y recovered and a series of forward drives led to a penalty which Kris Nelson took quickly to send Marc Thomas under the posts. True to form they then relaxed again and let in another score as Basildon's prop broke through by the posts.

To compound the situation a missed penalty attempt just after the kick off led to a knock on under the posts and Basildon capitalised by scoring another try wide out.

Thereafter L&Y threw caution to wind and some expansive play led to Adams bustling over on the right of the posts. Brad Sutherland scored again from a long Nelson pass but it was not enough.