Chinnor’s side was much changed from the previous week’s fine performance, but was a strong looking side nonetheless. However when the game began, it looked as though the Chinnor lads forgot they were actually a team, they lacked much of their cohesion and team spirit that had been witnessed throughout the majority of the season so far. As a result, Maidenhead put the first points on the board with a penalty kick, quickly followed by a try that was in turn converted. Chinnor continued to play in this disjointed fashion, allowing another penalty to Maidenhead which was converted again by their seemingly on form kicker.

A massive hit from ‘Wild Bill’ Taylor from the restart seemed to reawaken Chinnor’s senses and they were seemingly back in the game. George white decided to start throwing onto the lineouts properly and the forwards began to actually ruck. This enabled some strong runs from newbie Adam Draper, the returning Jon Down and Josh Culbert. But although Chinnor were camped on the Maidenhead try line for the final 10 minutes of the half, they failed to capitalise and turn their dominace into points.

The score at the half-time mark was 13-0 to the visitors. Captain George White made some changes during the break, the injured Tom White (knee) and James Way (ankle) came off, as did Jayson Abbott for a slight bruise on his tail bone. This saw Simon Hill and George Culbert come on, Tom Wiltshire was relieved of his duty as touch judge (thank goodness) and came on at Second Row.

Chinnor began the second half as they had ended the first. They were retaining the ball well and spent the first ten minutes camped out again on the maidenhead try line. Maidenheads defence was solid, but Chinnor this time utilized their dominance and turned it into 5 points with a try from Jon Down. The conversion was perfectly bounced off the upright by George Culbert to reduce the deficit to 13-7.

It appeared that Chinnor were back in the game and continued to play well, Maidenhead lost a man to the sin bin, which gave the perfect opportunity for Chinnor to come to the fore. However, from the penalty, Chinnor’s scrum half decided to tap and go and pass the ball directly to Maidenhead who passed through the hands and touched down and converted to make it 20-7.

Chinnor’s heads went down, Dane White was sin binned, and Maidenhead pushed for an extended lead. The game ended 33-7 in favour of Maidenhead.

The Chinnor players were well aware of what went wrong on what was always going to be a hard day. There were some individual performances worth noting, George Culbert, Josh Culbert and Dane White stood out. However the Man of the Match performance came from Adam Draper.

Tries: J. Down
Conversions: G. Culbert

Man of the Match: A. Draper
Mare of the Match: T. Wiltshire

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