Chesham 12-20 Henley 3's 

By David Lewis

Newly promoted Henley 3’s travelled to Chesham for the first game of this new season. Expecting stronger opposition after winning every game in the last and with six new starters, it represented an interesting challenge to produce another winning combination.

Henley had started many of last season’s games with very prompt scores and it was to be the same again with scrum-half Tom Longley taking an early opportunity by picking up off the back of the ruck to score in Chesham’s corner.  The angle was too wide and the wind too strong for fly-half Brad Fox to clinch the conversion, but it put Henley ahead by 5 points, making a promising start.

Chesham are predominantly a single team club so are all well known to each other and have a strong forward structure, which would push back the Henley forwards throughout the game.  However, it was not long before Longley struck again, breaking through the Chesham defence and setting up Fox to convert, taking Henley to 12 points ahead.

Injury to Henley players became the real feature of the match and within half an hour they had used their full complement of substitutes of four players.  Henley were then forced to play uncontested scrums, which meant dropping a player, presenting Chesham with the extra player opportunity.

Although Chesham pressed hard and had several promising opportunities to score, there was along period before they were able to get their own converted points on the scoreboard, taking the half-time score to 7 points to 12 in Henley’s favour.

With the rolling substitutes option Henley were able to start the second half back to a full fifteen and new recruit, Joe Beesley took his first points for the team off the wing, but again too wide for the conversion.  Chesham’s forward strength finally gained them points and they responded with a push over try in Henley’s corner.

At 12 points to 17, the game was too close to call and Henley were forced to return to uncontested scrums not once but twice and finally ended up with only 13 players on the pitch as a result.  As full time approached Henley wisely took the option of a penalty kick and added the three points to their score, taking them out of reach and the game finished with Henley the winners at 20 points to 12.

With so many new starters and the injury toll throughout the match, Henley did well to hold on and win the game, but it showed promise for the season ahead.

 Photos courtesy of Camron Page