Storm make history with first
victory over foreign side

South London Storm completed their pre-season trial campaign on Saturday at Storm Park with a win over Paris National 1 side Montgeron XIII in an open match with some fantastic tries.

The young French side, a potential sister club for the Storm, visited London for the weekend, taking in the Broncos-Bradford match on Sunday and sampling some of the London nightlife in between.

Montgeron opened the scoring after a good backline move saw their number 4 break a tackle and score out wide in the 7th minute for 4-0, before Al Ridout barged over for the Storm with a try after an error from the kickoff.

The try of the match came in the 15th minute with Souths moving the ball from one wing to the other and back to Tane Kingi who crashed over under the posts. Louis Neethling converted, 10-4.

The "Saffer connection" laid on the Storm's third try in the 24th minute with Louis Boshoff backing up a great break by Neethling, who followed up to take an overhead pass and score under the posts and convert his own try for 16-4.

Montegron pegged one back in the 33rd minute after 13 ran into a big gap and was backed up inside by the fullback for a converted try and 16-10. Nathan Morris darted over from dummy half out wide right on half-time for 20-10.

South London kicked off the second half with a number of outstanding ball movements which resulted in tries to Phil Molloy and two more to Tane Kingi to open up a 36-10 lead.

Montgeron's fullback scored his second in the 56th minute after a backline move from the French side, before the Storm wrapped the match up with two tries to prop Gavin Hill.

Kingi was voted man of the match for his 3 tries, prop Hill stood out with a number of big hits, Neethling was again hard for the opposition to handle and debutant Taniela Naitau caught the eye with some great runs out wide.

South London 46 (Kingi 3, Hill 2, Ridout, Neethling, Morris, Molloy tries; Neethling 3, Ferguson 2 goals) beat Montgeron XIII Rams 16.

South London Storm starting XIII: Phil Molloy, Cormac Lomasney, Carl Zacharow, Rich Pitchfork, Matt Fuller; John Fergusson, Tani Kingi; Louis Boschoff, Nathan Morris, Gav Hill, Louis Neethling, Al Ridout, Rich Singleton.

The season proper kicks of this Saturday with the first playing Ipswich Rhinos at 2.30pm at Storm Park, preceded at 1245 by the seconds playing Hemel Stags.