The visitors arrived at Westleigh Park to be shunted onto a back pitch with the main one waterlogged, but their maul worked wonders with skipper Hayman riding over three times, and a penalty try forced.
With Oli Rhoads having opened the scoring on six minutes and the captain bagging a fourth with a close-range finish at the end of the third quarter, tries from Bronson Mellowes, Jake Sterland and Joe Plunkett – plus nine points from the boot of Luke Bouchier – were not enough for Lions.
Reflecting on a gutsy triumph, Max said: “We’ve come off a hard run with three losses on the bounce, so to come down to a third pitch and play the way the boys did, it was outstanding.
“We had a three-hour journey and we’re used to travelling, so no matter the circumstances you expect to play.
“Speaking to the boys, there was a bit of nostalgia – we’ve all been young, played at our junior clubs often in the middle of nowhere with no crowd, no floodlights and we all enjoyed it.
“It was a blast from the past.”
Skipper hails young squad
He continued: “We went out there with complete freedom, there was no crowd atmosphere, just a case of go out there, try and play good rugby and have some fun.
“We’re an evolving young squad with some amazing players. (Mikey) Duda, Liam (Elston) are both early 20s, the teenagers as well – (Harry) Bicknell and Paddy (Jackson) added to the atmosphere and on debut they were outstanding.
“I’m only 25 but we have great guys like Rowan (Grundy), Axel (Kalling-Smith), Ellis (Jones) and others who’ve grown into the squad.
“And we know the way the club is there will be more youngsters coming into challenge us in a few years’ time.”
Modest Max happy to be maul finisher
Max made history by becoming just the second Rams player to bag a quartet of scores in a Level Three contest, and despite missing the chance to smash Jak Rossiter’s record after being substituted with 15 minutes remaining, he was typically modest.
He confessed: “I take no credit at all. We wanted to attack with the maul but it’s credit to the rest of the boys – Harry Stone was again exceptional – and I’m the lucky finisher.”
Rams have a week off before hosting table-toppers Rotherham Titans for the Christmas fixture on Saturday, December 6 (3pm).
