Cam Claim Honours against Cornish

This Saturday we saw the return fixtures for the 1s and 2s against our local rivals London Cornish at a breezy and somewhat chilled Watchetts.
With the close rivalry between the 2 clubs over the last few seasons this was always going to be a challenge for Cam and this proved to be the case as, after a hard fought encounter with both sides giving their all, Cam finally did enough to claim the 5 points with The Pasty Eaters claiming a LBP.
The game got underway with Cam playing away from the clubhouse facing a stiff cross breeze and following a series of good Cam phases a penalty to Cornish took play into the home 22.
Cam won the resulting lineout and played multiple phases through forwards and backs but managed to lose possession and when they infringed the visitors had the chance to open the scoring with a pen on the 22 infront of the posts but the kick struck the upright and was touched down for a 22 drop out.
Shortly afterwards the visitors were awarded another pen and this time they opted for a 5m lineout but a great defensive steal by Cam again saw the home side break out from their own line and we had the sight of lock Hoff charging 50m up field brushing off most tackle attempts with ease but yet again, having reached the opposition 22 and with a try looking certain a knock on, turnover and then a pen saw the visitors back in the Cam 22 and despite losing their lineout again Cornish managed to move the ball out wide to dot down in the corner with 25 mins played.
From the restart we saw Cam quickly regain possession and some really good phases saw the ball moving across the park and back and a penalty saw play move to 15m from the Cornish line and a yellow card for the visitors seemingly gave Cam a slight advantage but despite at this stage playing all of the rugby the final pass wouldn't stick and suddenly we had the sight of the Cornish winger intercepting and charging through and only Ash the speedster was able to haul him down in the Cam 22.
However this was only a short respite as Cornish who minutes before were looking to be on the ropes swung the ball wide and poor defence by Cam saw them cross in the corner again for a 10-0 lead on 38 mins.
Again the restart saw Cam quickly regain possession and from a scrum on the Cornish 22 we saw a sweet backs move with Oyoni coming in from the blind side wing to arc around and outpace the opposition to touch down for a 5-10 score on half time.
The second half started with Cam definitely on the front foot and despite conceding another pen the black and ambers were soon on the attack and a great drive by Voighty saw him force his way into the 22 before sending Tommy A off on a scamper to touch down for an unconverted try which evened up the scores after just 47 mins.
And more was to come when, after winning yet another Cornish lineout, we saw Hoff again charging for the line and being really unlucky to be held up just short but from the resultant scrum Cam set up a series of pick and goes and again it was Ozzie Greg emerging from the pile of bodies full of smiles and with Matty converting the score was now 17-10 with 52 mins played.
The restart was again taken superbly by Hughsey and one of several surges by Dyl again saw Cam in the red zone but they were unable to capitalise on the position.
However Cam were soon on the attack again when Ash chased a fly hack from halfway only to overrun the ball close to the line and Ozzie Greg, yes it also surprised the supporters as much as our smiling prop, was the next man up, but he could not gather cleanly and from the resultant scrum 5 Cam made a hash of a pushover try.
The black and ambers, at this stage, were playing all of the rugby and when they attacked again down their right a seriously high tackle brought another session on the naughty step for the Cornish flanker and this time the 5m scrum was executed perfectly with Mac claiming the touch down for a 22-10 score and a bonus point on 65 mins.
The game again became a tad scrappy with Cam thinking they had done enough and Cornish striving for points of any sort and on 77 mins they again exploited a weakness out wide to score a try and with the touchline conversion good it brought the score to 22- 17. The last few mins were extremely tense for both sets of supporters but when the ref finally blew for full time the feeling of relief from the Cam faithful was palpable.

So another great result for the black and ambers who again adapted well despite missing a number of players who have been regulars for several seasons ie with Sophie the physio still trying to locate Smarty's brain following a collision with Lurch in training more than a week ago, The Warrior having carried a nasty groin injury for months was eventually forced to rest it for a couple of weeks, Josh Wright our regular centre for 2/3 seasons having joined the Army at Xmas and who is now on basic training and The Flying Fijian moving to Nat 1 playing his first game for the Cambridge club.

Great performances across the squad with Ben Harrison stepping up for his first 80 mins in the 1s having an outstanding game and Baggy playing his first game for the 1s for a couple of seasons at 10 was sharp and kept his threequarter line moving.
The forwards in general had a really good shift yet again and easily won the scrum and lineout battles and possibly didn't get all the help they deserved from the official but these things happen.
Matty and Baggy worked well at 9 and 10 and Joe and Ash in the centre worked extremely hard in attack and defence and Oyoni's try was a peach and with TommyA performing as only Tommy can the boys can be satisfied with another really good result which maintains the 17 point gap to the 5th placed side and with 7Oaks beating Brighton it reduces the gap to the top to 8 points.
Next week the 1s have a break returning to league action on Feb 9th when they visit Chobham.

Meanwhile the 2s continued their unbeaten League record with a 27-10 win over Cornish 2s