Chelmsford crossed the river last weekend, to play Beccehamians RFC for the second time this season. Beccehamians are a strong side, placing second in the league last year behind London Irish Ladies, so the Bluebirds knew they would have their work cut out for them.
The first half saw Chelmsford force Beccehamians work incredibly hard to gain a lead and the two tries scored were from lucky breaks rather than a clear domination of the game. Chelmsford’s drift defence worked well and good pressure from the defensive line forced handling errors from the opposition.
Both teams turned the ball over frequently in a physical and fast paced game and some excellent runs by the Chelmsford back line saw them close to scoring. Unfortunately, there were several instances of poor passing from Chelmsford and they were unable to keep their momentum against a strong Beccehamian defence.
After 2 good breaks from Beccehamian, the score at half time was 14-0.
Whilst Chelmsford felt positive about their performance at half time, Beccehamian clearly had a stern speech from their coaching team, because they came out hard for the second half. Within 2 minutes, they had scored an unconverted try and in doing so, set the tone for the rest of the half.
Chelmsford let their drift defence slow and let the opposition run to them. Beccehamian ran excellent support lines and relied on the offload to get the ball out, which was highly effective as they scored time and time again in the last 25 minutes of play.
Whilst a lot of the foundations Chelmsford have worked on since their last meeting with Beccehamian RFC have paid off, a lack of discipline was costly and ultimately Beccehamian were the stronger team.
Chelmsford take on Westcliff in the Junior Plate next weekend and their first league fixture of 2020 will see them home Harlow on Sunday 5 January. Kick off for both fixtures will be 2pm.