Although the first match for the Chinnor Colts has been a long time coming, Sunday saw an almost full strength Colts team ready to take on Windsor at home. The day was set fair and with the side made up with 16 players from last seasons U17’s, Mark Wilkinson from last season’s Colts and Elliott Behan from the current U17 crop of players, primed and ready for battle. Windsor arrived with 19 players, unfortunately due to injuries etc., they did not have enough players for a competitive front row, so the agreed decision was to play the match with uncontested scrums, this was not an ideal scenario, as it would have been good to give our pack a contest in this first match, however this did play to Windsor’s strength by enabling them to field 13 backs, to give a speed advantage.

Chinnor kicked off and immediately took the advantage with powerful forward play, dominating their opposition, which continued throughout the half, to the point that Windsor never progressed out of their half of the pitch for the whole first half. Chinnor ended the half 29-0 up, this was capped by a text book move from a lineout for the final try of the first half, the catch and drive lineout worked superbly carrying the ball 10 metres before scrum half Tom green released the ball to the backs, slick passing along the line and Sam Jones cut a line which could only be described as sublime, to finish under the posts.

The second half Chinnor were facing into the wind and started the half as they meant to go on with a try within the first 5 minutes. Unfortunately Chinnor then let a lapse in their concentration, giving away penalties for offside at the ruck, subsequently Windsor provided some slick back moves themselves, allowing their backs to show what they were capable of given space and crossed the whitewash to score under the posts. After this Chinnor once again did not look back scoring a further 4 tries, the pick of which was a try straight from receiving the kick off with George White catching and offloading to Joe Rackstraw who ran ¾ the length of the pitch before offloading to Jack Green who in turn released Baz Corpe to turn on the afterburners and outpace the defence to score.

This was a very promising start to the Colts season and a total team performance, showing what 15 man rugby is all about. Therefore there is no man of the match as each and every player contributed significantly to this performance. Special mention should however go to Elliot Behan who slotted into the side as though he had played with this team for years. A special mention to Windsor, who never gave up and competed admirably, also to their coaching staff and supporters who were excellent and supportive of good rugby from both sides