Amersham & Chiltern RFC succumb in 'ill-tempered' game

MATCH REPORT: Chippenham RFC  20–7  Amersham & Chiltern RFC, Saturday, January 28. Click here for photo gallery from the game.

After two wins on the bounce, Amersham & Chiltern travelled to Chippenham with confidence, remembering the return home game was only lost in the last minute of play. Regrettably it was not to be.

A poor start saw Chiltern concede the first try after only four minutes when a speculative kick by the Chippenham scrum half wasn't caught cleanly by the Chiltern defence and the Chippenham no 8, who had an outstanding game, picked up and ran 50 metres to score in the corner.

Chiltern weren't daunted by the set back and patiently used the wind in their favour to get into the opposition half where a lovely double miss move enabled Craig Webb to force his way over for  a try, well converted by Ross Bugden. 

This really seemed to upset Chippenham who retaliated in off-the-ball incidents culminating in a very unfortunate incident which left fly half Rob Smalley with a very badly swollen and bruised eye. It was not seen by the referee who at the next ruck sin binned Chiltern's Ollie Cato for a technical offence. Chippenham took advantage of Chiltern's depleted numbers.

Try as they might Chiltern couldn't convert considerable possession into points and faced the wind in the second half 10-7 down.

Another mistake early on saw Chippenham steal possession at a Chiltern scrum and their flanker ran 30 metres for the third unconverted try. As the game moved into the final quarter, another incident saw a Chippenham player yellow carded but the aggrieved Chiltern player was Ollie Cato who retaliated and was given his second yellow card so took no further part in the game. 

Against the wind and with a player down it was backs to the wall and some heroic defence saw Chiltern hold out until five minutes from time when Chippenham crossed for the fourth and last time for a try which was unconverted.

Not a good day at the office but a very good learning experience against an aggressive streetwise West Country team. Next week Chiltern host high-flying Redingensians at Weedon Lane, kick off 2.30pm.

By Amersham & Chiltern RFC