A depleted squad battled against Banbury but were unable to mount a serious challenge on the weekend and ended up going down to a heavy 63-5 defeat. In a difficult week of preparations due t an increasing injury list and disrupted by player availability the squad that took the field gave their all.

From the previous match Captain Tom Aherne has been ruled out for an extended period with a knee injury, Rudi Reid was on a short term loan; Joe Franklin, James Astin, Mike Volaikisuva and Nemani Rayabo were all at Twickenham, for the England game and Dan Price was struggling with illness. Oli Mitchell, Marcus Holt and Ben Stewart came in for their first 1st team games of the season having all been injured for a number of weeks. Ideally they would have had a chance to regain some match fitness beforehand.

It was a tough opening 40 minutes for the Nuns and despite one or two half chances created they were on the back foot and struggled to match the visitors who over powered them a look a threat with ball in hand. When the referee blew for half time the score read 42-0 to Banbury.

To the players credit, they picked themselves up at half time and dug their heals in. Despite conceding a seventh try they managed to secure and retain more possession. This lead to some sustained periods of pressure.

Banbury then had two players sent to the sin bin and finally the Nuns got on the score board. The ball was moved wide for the returning Mitchell to cross out wide. Turner Jones conversion struck a post and fell short. Despite more opportunities, some over eagerness and a lack of accuracy, the Nuns couldn’t add any further scores.

Banbury did and the game finished with a 63-5 defeat.

Head Coach Huw Thomas added “We are in a tough situation at the moment with player availability. Through some serious injuries acquired already this season we’ve struggled to put out a settled side and have been missing a number of big players for a long period. They are both big in experience but also physical attributes, and so we are conceding power but the players are digging in as well as they can. We could have gone completely in our shells with the score at half time but they came back and fought well but as has been the case this season, we’ve lost another senior player to a broken ankle. We hope for a change in fortunes as soon as we can.’’

1 Tyler Freeman 2 Louis Addleton 3 Ryan Marsh 4 Ryan Iles 5 James O’Donoghue 6 Jack Iles 7 Toby Dearden 8 Arron Skyrme 9 Marcus Holt 10 Turner Jones 11 Darcey Bunce 12 Tom Eales 13 Andy Murray 14 Tak Chawadya 15 Ben Stewart 16 Joe Ogbonna 17 Oli Mitchell 18 Huw Thomas