Chiltern chasing shadows

Since A&C's own match report is unprintable, we have taken the liberty of copy/paste Tunbridge Juddians own match report...

TJs entertained new opponents Amersham & Chiltern at The Slade last Saturday. At the start of the match the two clubs had the same league points with A&C having the better points difference.

The match started rather tentatively with some nervous kicking for position and some indifferent handling.

TJs were first to score after some ten minutes and a spell of good ball retention winger, Richie Nauer, made inroads into the A&C defence which Charlie Harding carried on to put full-back JJ Murray in for a try which Miki Zanirato converted.

TJs showed early intention in attack and their second try came when A&C knocked on in the centre and the loose ball popped up into the welcoming arms of hooker Dean Kingi. With A&C’s back division up in attack he found no derender in front of him and with commendable speed beat the chasing cover to touch down under the posts. Zanirato converted and after a quarter of the match TJs were 14 – 0 ahead.

TJs defended A&C’s penalty kick and line-out in the corner and, returning to the other end of the field, after two penalties of their own they produced a maul which slowly but surely drove the ball over the line for flanker Richie Bent to score. Once more Zanirato converted. And, just four minutes later Richie Nauer intercepted A&C’s pass and after a long run-in he added TJ’s fourth and bonus try with just thirty minutes gone. Zanirato converted.

At this stage A&C were looking more than a little shell-shocked. They had been unable to penetrate TJ’s defence and despite having more than a fair share of possession and field position it seemed that whenever and wherever TJs laid hands on the ball they would score a try.

And before half-time more such misery was heaped on the visitors. Firstly, in a period of broken play where A&C failed to clear the danger TJ’s Richie Bent did manage to grab and hold onto the ball and off-load to Charlie Harding for TJ’s fifth try. Secondly, Will Ward on the wing found himself under pressure when he received a poor, bouncing pass. Everyone expected that he would either lose possession of the ball going backwards or somehow manage to scramble the ball into touch. He did neither. Instead he spun round ball in hand, somehow evaded the oncoming tacklers, made good distance up the touch-line and found Richie Bent on hand to take a scoring pass for his second and TJ’s sixth try. Both tries were converted by Zanirato and to add insult to injury he closed the first half with a penalty which took TJs to a massive 45 – 0 lead.

Everything had gone well for TJs. They had scored six goals often from their own half and had survived the attacks of A&C whose every attempt, under fast, aggressive defence by TJs, had come to nought. They had conceded 45 points into the bargain and would probably have expected to be blasted away during the second forty minutes of the match.

It did not work out like that. TJs probably relaxed their intensity feeling that the tries would come regularly as they had in the first half. A&C on the other hand must have received a serious talking-to during an uncomfortable half-time break and would be doing their best to thwart this disturbing possibility.

TJs started the second half slowly and A&C showed early signs that they were picking up the gauntlet when it took a strong break-out by Pat Sykes and a clearing kick by Luke Giles to relieve a period of pressure from the visitors.

There were signs that TJ’s infallibility had not continued into the second half when a good move ended short of the line with a dropped pass. However, following a good, clean catch at the line-out by skipper Toby Martin TJs drove the maul over the line where it was held up. But they did score their seventh try when from the ensuing five-metre scrum TJ’s backs contrived some fine inter-passing to put Hugo Watson over in the corner. Miki Zanirato had his first goal-kick failure of the afternoon from this wide position. Would this try, half-way into the second half, open the flood gates to TJs?

It did not. A&C came back strongly. It looked as though they had blown a certain chance when their centre three-quarter decided to go for the line on his own instead of shipping the ball on to his winger who would have had a pretty clear run for the line. But they managed to keep possession and had soon worked a gap in TJ’s defensive line for hooker Zane Turner to score a try which Jack Kenyon converted.

Strangely, TJ’s Sykes was yellow-carded on the half-way line for being off-side and with the man advantage a now-rejuvenated A&C produced their second try through full back Chris Jack. Jack Kenyon converted and Amersham & Chiltern had “won” the second half of a game in which they had taken a bit of a pounding by 5 – 14!

Had TJs sub-consciously relaxed? Had fortune finally rewarded a resilient A&C with their proper dues? The match was well and truly won by TJs by half-time and their try-scoring momentum may have been interrupted by the ten-minute break in play. This certainly was a game of two halves and it will be interesting to see what happens when the two teams meet again in the return match in February.

This win continues TJ’s recent improvement placing them in sixth position in the league. League leaders, Westcombe Park, surprisingly suffered their first defeat of the season to Hertford giving some encouragement to the chasers.