Amersham & Chiltern 2nd XV 34 - 17 Reading 2nd XV

On the hottest October day in recorded history the Saxons took on a strong Reading side in a friendly fixture. the starting team was Lurch, Paddy, BooBoo front row, Pencil and the ever young Mikey G in the Row, the back row consisted of debutant Mike Gallagher, Yogi and Luke Thundertree, Sitzy at 9 Smally type T at 10 centers of PJ and Dan Crehan and a back 3 of Liam,Hackers and Josh Davies, as it was a friendly we took a couple of extra players on the bench we welcomed back from injury Jack Kenyon, Tom Fletcher and Darren Smith. Will Howe, Chris Fletcher and Nick Fisher completed the Line up.

We played towards the club house in the first half and were on the front foot from the start, this early pressure told as Reading infringed at the break down, we kicked for the corner and from the line out 5m out paddy hit Luke with a perfect throw and a good set up saw Yogi pop over for the try (see lads training works!) After this early bit of dominance we were rocked by the loss of Sitzy to an ankle injury forcing Jack Kenyon to come on and play out of position at scrum half, a cruel blow for Sitzy who had started the game in a spritely fashion, this coupled with the fact we seemed to relax and assume that the game was won already meant that Reading came back strongly and scored through their winger. This is where my memory gets a tad hazy as to the order of the trys!Mike Gallager grabbed 2 trys, one supporting the back line with a classic amber 12 move following on from good work in the center's by PJ and one more close in effort being pushed over the line and using his strength to get the ball down, unfortunately after his second try he had to leave the pitch following a clash of heads and was replaced by Nick Fisher. Josh Davies completed the scoring for chiltern in the first half when good vision from Smally saw him call the switch and good hands from Yogi and Smally sent Josh away down the blind side, but still with a lot of work to do,Josh chipped ahead gathered well and jotted down. In the mean time Reading had scored another due to some poor covering on Chiltern front and some nifty footwork by the Reading players.
HT 24-14
At Half time there was a realisation that we should have been out of sight but we were commiting too many people to the rucks and mauls and not being strong enough in the contact area to place the ball back on our side, hence there was a bit of a s#%t fight at every ruck, requiring us to overcommit to get the ball back. Paddy was replaced at half time by Chris Fletcher and Darren Smith replaced Luke on the flank. The Saxons really upped their game in the second half with people fighting hard to place the ball back resulting in quicker ball and giving the pack greater freedom to support the backs, unfortunately we lost Chris Fletcher also to an ankle injury bringing Will howe into the game, even with all the changes our line out managed to work well throughout (3 diffferent hookers throwing in) at some point in the half both Luke and Mike Gallager came back on the pitch (we were allowed rolling subs) We scored 2 well worked trys one from Yogi breaking off the back of a maul and powering over and an even more powerfull run by Tom smally who dragged 3 people over the line before touching down. In all this scoring hackers managed a couple of conversions and Reading Slotted a penalty.

FT 34-17

Man of the Match went too former first team captain Mikey Griffiths for a great all round display with a number of strong carries great takes all day in the line out and a tireless work rate around the park
Mentioned in Dispatches Mike Galleger for a great debut performance including 2 trys