Chichester beat Bournemouth in an Oaklands Park thriller
Chichester welcomed Bournemouth to Oaklands Park in Hampshire Counties 1 – and ran out narrow 34-31 winners.
Blues made six changes from the side that lost 33-23 to Winchester, with Josh Brown, Dan Heriot and Harry Clark joining the forwards, Luca Fleming and Rob Hennig returning in the backs and Josh Cameron on the bench.
Heavy rain abated before the match with blue skies making an appearance as the stiff breeze off the Solent moved the clouds inland.
On a good to soft pitch, Chichester kicked off down the slope. After four minutes, a run along the touchline from Rhys Thompson and Luca Fleming moved the ball deep into Bournemouth territory. The ball was recycled to Owen Tucker for a try out wide, converted by Tom Mahon.
Further pressure won Blues a penalty that was kicked for a lineout 15m out. The ball was secured and the Chichester pack mauled forward at speed overwhelming the defence, with Tyrese Makasi peeling off to dot down, converted by Mahon – 14-0.
Despite Blues early dominance in the set piece, Bournemouth had levelled the score within six minutes as their centres carved through the Chichester defence to score two converted tries.
On 23 minutes, another penalty allowed Blues to reprise their long distance rolling maul from the lineout, with Huw Binfield on hand to score.
The visitors closed the gap on the half-hour with a penalty but Chichester were back on the attack and it seemed Oscar de Lacy was going to score a solo breakaway try.
The referee called him back and it was the forwards who advanced the ball to the posts, with a big carry by Binfield, where the ball was recycled to Makasi who bullied his way through the visitors’ scrambling defence to score the bonus point try, converted by Mahon for a 26-17 lead.
Again, Bournemouth’s response was immediate with a converted try.
But on the stroke of half-time, Blues won a lineout deep inside the opposition half. With MoM Dan Heriot securing the ball at the front of the lineout the unstoppable pack again started to rumble forward with Finlay Glass at the tail to dot down for Chichester’s fifth try and a 31-24 interval lead.
Bournemouth started the second half with all guns blazing and it took Blues 15 minutes to break out of their own half, despite the visitors losing a player to the sin bin.
After 20 minutes of spirited defence from Chichester and poor handling from the opposition, Bournemouth ran in their bonus point try with an individual effort from the half way line, converted to make it 31-31.
Bournemouth lost a player to the bin on 70 minutes but had the opportunity to take the lead five minutes later, after a high tackle on the 22m line.
The kick went wide and with less than five minutes to go, Chichester upped the tempo. With the referee playing advantage for a knock-on, the ball was spun out to Ethan Etherington who outflanked the defence to cross the whitewash in Vultures’ Corner, but the try was disallowed for a forward pass and play was bought back for a scrum.
Having dominated the scrum all match, Chichester were awarded their first penalty with two minutes to play. Mahon slotted the ball between the uprights.
From the restart Bournemouth were deemed to have knocked on and from the subsequent scrum Josh Brown tapped the ball into touch to end the game and secure five hard earned points.