Bishops Stortford 17 Amersham & Chiltern 15
19th October 2008by Ian Hopkinson
The listing was posted by Amersham & Chiltern RFC - u16s: Match Reports
Having played a training friendly at home, Chiltern made the long journey to Bishops Stortford for an A team friendly against a side that was sure to test the mettle of a squad suffering injuries to key players, including skipper Steve Wiggill who had been named as cover in the back row but was forced to withdraw at the last minute. As a result Zak Underwood was brought into the pack as a starting flanker.
Chiltern made a positive start but their early good work was undone when the ball was lost in contact whilst on the attack and with little defensive cover Stortford opened the scoring with an unconverted try.
Chiltern soon struck back when a rolling maul crashed over the line but the ball was ruled to have been held up. From the resulting 5 metre scrum Alex Miller saw a gap in the Stortford defence to bring the scores level but he was unable to convert the try.
The game was flowing back and forth with neither side able to build up any real momentum, but Chiltern were the authors of their own downfall when they gave away a penalty about 15 metres out. The cover was there but the defence failed to deal with the powerful run from a Stortford forward who went in under the posts for a converted try.
Again Chiltern hit back strongly and after an excellent take at the line out by Alex Michaels, the forward drive sucked in the Stortford defence and when the ball was released to the backs Joe Stevens had the pace to score in the corner to make the half time score 12-10 to Stortford.
A lengthy break after half time for treatment to one of the Stortford forwards seemed to disrupt Chiltern’s play and they spent long periods of the second half on the defensive and Stortford scored another unconverted try after a period of sustained pressure to lead 17-10.
That looked to be the end of the scoring until Sean Chamunorwa burst through the Stortford defence and ran half the length of the pitch to score under the posts. 17-15 and the conversion to come so a draw looked secure but unfortunately the kick bounced back off the post and Chiltern were left facing a rare defeat.
A case of so near and yet so far with a lot of good play but individual mistakes costing the side dearly. Well done to the squad comprising: Harry Andrews, Tom Watts, Ben Symington, Jack Freeman, Alex Michaels, Zak Underwood, Ed Wainwright, Jack Benson, Sam Privett, James Hackney, Joe Stevens, Alex Miller, Sean Chamunorwa, Conor Jordan, Lewis Evans and subs Peter Hopkinson, Dominic Walshaw, Chris Royals, Jack Rogers, and Henry Griffin.