CALNE moved within two games of gracing the hallowed turf of Twickenham at the weekend when beating Berkshire Shire Hall in the Southern Counties Junior Vase final.

A 36-12 victory for Calne sees them move into the South West Junior Vase final, where they will host Gloucester side Spartans on Saturday, March 18.

Against Shire Hall, the Anchor Road men were put on the back foot early on by the visitors as Berkshire grabbed an unconverted try in the opening few minutes.

However, Calne quickly responded when skipper Tom Morten released winger Jamie Palmer to run in and score in the corner. Liam Kearney added the difficult conversion to give the hosts a 7-5 lead.

A clever box kick from Dan Treacy saw Kearney race away and score his team’s second try of the day, which he converted himself.

As well as the pacy backs making inroads, Calne’s forwards were showing their dominance at the set-piece, with Bruce Harper and Keith Bradley spoiling the visitors' attempts to recycle the ball quickly.

Calne’s front three of Morten, Dave Evans and Pete Brownlie also drove Shire Hall back at scrum time, while Matt Johnston, Chris McAlonan and Alan Wicks impressed around the breakdown.

Adam Young, who was putting in a fine performance, ran in under the posts for Calne’s third try of the match after beating four defenders.

After some Shire Hall pressure, which was quickly dealt with by full-back Mark Webber, Brownlie drove over the line for Calne to increase their lead.

Calne wrapped up their scoring after going through a number of phases to allow joint man-of-the-match McAlonan to dive over.

However, Berkshire grabbed a second try with the final play of the match.

Chairman Chris Austin said: “It was another great day for Calne rugby.

“We are now two games away from a final at Twickenham but we will keep our feet on the ground.”