Tough pre season opener

A tough opener for Chiltern 2xv against an experienced and powerful Hertford team which saw them lose narrowly 17-20.

The opening 20 minutes saw Hertford build an early 6-0 lead with two penalty kicks converted by their scrum half. It took a moment of brilliance from Caleb Jenkins to open the scoring for Chiltern; a huge tackle on the halfway line saw the ball pop up for Caleb to run the length of the pitch and fend off the chasing winger.

The kick converted under the sticks by Dan Wood to give Chiltern a 7-6 half time lead.

HT 7-6

The second half saw more of an open game with fitness levels on both sides creating space for the attack.

Chiltern spent the opening 10 minutes in the Hertford 22 with two disallowed tries in either corner, the pressure wasn't converted and in turn Hertford scored a breakaway try under the posts and converted to put them ahead 7-13.

A very poor tackle from Hertford led to a penalty in front of the posts which Dan Wood slotted well to keep Chiltern within a score 10-13.

Hertford then stepped up a gear and through multiple phases scored through their replacement front row, this was again converted making the score 10-20 with 5 minutes to go.

Chiltern had one final attack and worked their way back into the Hertford half; with a lineout catch & drive Luke Donnebaum touched down in the corner and Dan Wood once again converted very well making the final score 17-20.

A narrow loss but lots of positives to work on and a few key areas to improve before Chiltern 2xv travel to Witney next week for their opening BBO1 league match.

FT 17-20

Best of luck to all of those who got injured and we wish all of them speedy recoveries and finally congratulations to the 1xv who got a brilliant 40-20 win at Hertford in National 3 London.

Line up:
1 Dan Pettinger 2 Paddy Esson 3 Aidan Lever 4 Luke Donnebaum 5 Colm Gilhooly 6 Mike Shaw 7 Ben Owen (c) 8 Giles Westgarth 9 Will Browne 10 Ollie Choules 11 Joe Carey 12 Dan Wood 13 Toby Neill 14 Michael Brothers 15 Ryan Greenstreet (vc) 16 Sam Allen 17 Ed Jones 18 Caleb Jenkins 19 Johnny Rice

Tries:
Caleb Jenkins
Luke Donnebaum

Conversions:
Dan Wood x2

Penalty:
Dan Wood

Man of the Match:
Dan Wood