D's take the direct route to opening victory

OD’s 2014 vintage has been remodelled by coach Smith with grunt clearly a priority. This manifested itself in domination of the contact area, robust defence and direct yards made ball in hand. Once the big men had done their work, wide men Brown and Ilo profited from the destruction caused to finish clinically. In a very satisfactory outing the only downsides were the set piece with both scrum and line out needing a little more work and the failure to claim the forth try bonus point.

D’s kicked up the slope in the first half with deft touches from debutant centre Graham Purdy and bullocking runs from prop Perlain catching the eye. The dust covers were removed from Jeremy Scott and he was wheeled out at 10. As ever he put in an effective shift. A muscular try from winger Iro and the previously unseen kicking skills of Reay, countered by two H & W penalties accounted for the 13 6 halftime scoreline.

D’s started the second half at a lick and keeping it tight they drove the H & W defence backwards until the crucial surge was made by prop Gumushian who powered under the last covering defenders for the score. The conversion was Chad Reay’s only unsuccessful kick of the afternoon as his effort rebounded off the bar. H & W responded to this score with their most concerted period of pressure. D’s defended a series of 5 metre scrums with committed tackling and a measure of illegality. The visitors are entitled to wonder why it took six penalties in the red zone before the ref finally brandished the yellow, flanker Marinov taking the team sanction. H & W butchered their best chance of this series when the visitors No 8 (who endured an afternoon to forget) knocked on at the base of an advancing scrum when he only needed to touch the ball down to score. H & W came away empty handed but scored shortly after with a good finish in the corner after a break from deep in their own half.

The result was nailed down when the ball squirted out of a scrum and Brown gathered Purdy’s delicate chip to score a fine try. This took the score to 31 11 and sealed the result. H & W put a gloss of the scoresheet with a late try of their own.

So a solid start with a number of impressive performances from the new players. With the probable return of a couple of last years key contributors plus better expected availability the Old Boys can look forward to the season with a sense of real optimism.

Next week sees us lock horns with local rivals Bromley, 3pm at Barnet Wood Road.