Checkmate

After last week’s loss to Hendon, Harlequins were looking to get back to winning ways and so welcomed a struggling Chess Valley to St Mary’s where Quins are undefeated.

Suffering a bit of an injury crisis Jason Edmunds (neck), Alec Smail (foot), Ed Barrett (ankle) and Mark Taylor (leg) to name a few there was a bit of a new feel to the Harlequins teams, welcoming Ash Armel-Close back to a starting berth at 13, Luke Povey moving from 15 to 12, George Jaques from 12-10 and Morgan Reece slotting in at 15 was a very different back line to previous games.

After missing last week due to driving around London looking for a parking space for 4 hours, Aaron was originally selected to play 12, but he arrived after suffering from food poisoning the night before, he looked like he was going to ruin his shirt and his shorts if he played. Luke Nugent took his place, starting on the bench, his first game since Dave Love broke his hand with his calves of steel.

Chess Valley also suffering an injury crisis it was revealed to us, started with the biggest fly half I have ever seen, around 6’ 5” and weighing no less than 18 stone, he was a sight as he stepped up to kick off. The game didn’t have the best of starts as Jon Ede knocked on with the first touch of the game.

Chess Valley were a sizeable team, and so Quins were expecting another forward oriented game like last week. The difference being this week, the defence around the breakdown was effective but more importantly Quins didn’t get sucked into playing that style of rugby but played a quick tempo with the back line. It didn’t take long to see the difference in pace in the back line as Sam Rickman scooted round his defender and outpaced the covering full back to score after a couple of minutes, George Jaques trust right boot added the conversion, 7-0.

Since the match and it was only a couple of days ago, I have completely forgotten the order of the scorers so I apologise, but I will just go through what I remember.

I will start with what I think was the pick of the tries, sorry Liam it’s not yours. After some great forward play punching up the ball and winning quick ball for Paul Hibbert, the ball came to Luke Povey who stepped the first player, and then as the full back tackled him offloaded to Morgan Reece coming on at pace to touch down. George once again accurate with the kick.

After another line break the ball came to Liam Constable who judging by the look of surprise on his face is not used to running with ball in hand. He did well though running in from I would say 17m but I think Liam has it up to about 40m now, to touch down under the posts. The conversion was once again good.

After a long time injury Ash Armel-Close was back to his boshing best as he knocked over a couple of challenges and walked in the first of his brace.

I honestly can’t remember who scored the 5th and 6th tries but it was probably George Jaques, at the half Harlequins had scored 6 converted tries to lead 42-0.

The second half started with Chess Valley gaining some possession and territory, Harlequin defence held strong and soon countered to score at the other end. Whilst attempting a conversion from the far left touch line, the ball fell of George’s tee; with the opposition charging George picked the ball up and struck a drop kick that cannoned off the post, for his only miss of the game.

Apparently George scored another one from a fantastic Luke Povey off load, I must have had my head stuck in ruck as I didn’t see that one, but George completed his hat trick, and Ash his brace.

The last try that I do remember was at a Chess Valley scrum on their own 5m line, despite winning the ball, Paul Hibbert managed to disrupt his opposite number and dived over the line to score, the referee deemed it legal despite some protests by Chess Valley.

Unfortunately the game ended on a negative, as Chess Valley put together some phases and which ended up with Josh Carter defending an overlap on the wing, there was only going to be one result as Chess Valley touched down for their second, which was converted. Final score 61-14.

MoM – Chris Addis
DoD – Luke Povey

There is a break in the league fixtures this week, but we are looking to get a club side out for a friendly please let us know your availability asap, this is a great opportunity for some game time if you haven’t played much this season.

Two weeks time we are against Ickenham away. Make sure you are at training. For the forwards we have an extra training session on Monday 10 November, make yourself available for that.