Richmond Women have clinched their first victory of the 2019/20 Tyrrells Premier 15s season with a convincing bonus point win over Worcester Warriors Women.

In an emphatic performance, Richmond scored five tries to Worcester’s one to run away with a 35-8 win, in front of a boisterous home crowd.

Despite conceding the first try of the match in the 20th minute, Richmond hit back strongly five minutes later with prop Alex (Polish) Zdunek pushing her way over the line to score the home side’s first points of the season.

From there Richmond continued to apply enormous pressure to the Worcester defence and in the 39th minute with the visitors scrambling on their line, centre Ellie Boatman finished off an outstanding piece of attacking play to score Richmond’s second.

Two minutes into the second half and Richmond extended their lead to 20-8 with flanker Grace Moore touching down under the posts. It was successfully converted by fullback Jess Wooden.

With Worcester conceding a yellow card to lock Elizabeth Shermer in the 55th minute, Richmond had the ascendency, and nine minutes later Ellie Boatman was over for her second try of the match, following another superb attacking move. It gave the hosts a 28-8 lead with 15 minutes remaining.

As the clock ticked into the 79th minute, lock Hallie Taufoou rounded off an excellent Richmond display with a sensational intercept try. The American recruit, who ran 40 metres to score, was named the Player of the Match.

“It was a huge team effort, we all worked extremely hard and even when I was running away to score, I had two teammates on either side of me in support. I think that says a lot about our team and our desire to help each other”, Taufoou said.

Following the match, Head Coach Mike Panoho said: “It was a hugely positive result and while we still have a number of things to improve, the players showed great intent for the whole 80 minutes.

“For us it’s important that we continue building. We know where we want to get to, it’s only the start and we‘re confident we can push forward from here. I’m looking forward to another big challenge against Gloucester-Hartpury next week.”

Richmond Women’s next Tyrrells Premier 15s fixture is away against Gloucester-Hartpury Women next Saturday (KO 4:30pm).