Canterbury suffered their first defeat of the season in National League 3 London & South East when they were beaten 33-24 at home by Ampthill on Saturday.

The loss still leaves Canterbury 14 points clear of their nearest pursuers -Tonbridge Juddians and Ampthill – and remain favourites to lift the league title.

The leaders built up an 11-point lead, all of them scored by Martyn Beaumont (pictured). The full-back kicked an early penalty and then beat the defence to score an unconverted try which was followed by another penalty.

The visitors eventually responded with a converted try for an 11-7 half-time scoreline.

At the start of the second half, Ampthill scored two tries, one of which was converted, while at the other end Beaumont kicked two penalties to leave the visitors 19-17 ahead.

Ampthill then intercepted a speculative Canterbury pass to run in a try from distance which left a simple conversion.

A second converted try from a counter-attack killed any faint chance of a Canterbury revival. A late score by Sam Rogers from a driving maul was converted by Beaumont but it wasn’t enough to prevent Canterbury from slipping to their first defeat of the campaign.