Chinnor U16 girls entered their first fixture of the season with a mixture of excitement and some trepidation.
Buckingham arrived at Kingsey Road on a beautiful autumn Sunday armed with a powerful and well drilled side intent on imposing their physical game on a smaller but more mobile Chinnor team who were taking the field in a competitive fixture for the first time as a squad.
The first 25 minutes was a see-saw affair with numerous handling errors and re-set scrums making it hard for either side to get a grip of the game. However Buckingham’s game plan of sending big runners up the middle was being nullified time and time again by the ferocious tackling of Georgia and Niamh and excellent work at the breakdown by Megan and Imogen SM.
Some excellent tactical kicking by Immy W was putting the team in good positions and hard running from new captain Elsa and Tilly D at 12 was helping Chinnor to get over the gain line repeatedly.
Just before half time, Buckingham took advantage of a couple of cheap penalties to work their way up to the Chinnor line and good hands allowed the space for their strong 12 to crash over the try line by the posts for a converted try. (0-7).
The girls regrouped and from the restart had some good passages of play and were encamped in Buckingham's 22 only for their efforts to be thwarted by the half time whistle. That said, to only be 7-0 at the break was testament to the effort of the girls in the first half.

Chinnor started the 2nd half with renewed energy, and with a couple of players starting to feel the effects of a physical battle were thankful to see strong carries by Serenna and Heather start to make inroads into the Buckingham half. Occasionally Chinnor were let down by a lack of precision at the breakdown and this allowed Buckingham to benefit from some quick turnover ball. One such turnover allowed the elusive Buckingham full back to score a try out wide which was expertly converted by their kicker. (0-14).
This seemed to spur the Chinnor girls into action and with Charlotte M and Maisie L ruling the skies come lineout time, they were able to apply some pressure on a tiring Buckingham defence which led to a number of penalties near to the away sides try line. Eventually Megan was able to embark on one of her trademark bullocking runs and crash her way over for a well-deserved score. With Immy nonchalantly knocking over the tricky conversion Chinnor were well into the game with a little over a quarter of the match to go. (7-14).
With injuries now starting to take their toll Chinnor were having to move players around and after a good shift at 9, Freya D found herself right in the thick of our defensive effort making some great tackles from 7. The Chinnor scrum which had been solid all day was still holding out against a much bigger visiting pack, with Jessie C on her debut showing a glimpse of what we can look forward to later in the season.
Buckingham found enough space in the closing stages to score another 2 tries out wide, converting one to put a slight gloss on the score from their perspective.
The Chinnor bench of Holly, Serenna and Kelly had by now all been thrown into the fray and were making good runs out wide and supporting the defensive efforts, we also saw Amelia HG making her debut for Chinnor and acquitting herself extremely well, Lydia R making her first start at this level and showing some great touches out wide as well as making a nuisance of herself at the breakdown.
Despite the loss spectators, players and coaches were all pleased with our first run out and saw enough in the team performance to be excited about the season ahead.
Next week sees us at the annual Halton festival, and then with a friendly the week after the girls now have an opportunity to get plenty of game time under their belts before the next league match against our old friends from Gosford.