Chinnor aiming big in second Champ season
- 1022
Chinnor are hoping there will be no second season syndrome as they look to climb the Champ table.
Chinnor are preparing for only their second season of Champ Rugby but that has not hindered their ambitions for the upcoming season.
With former England and Harlequins No.8 Nick Easter as director of rugby, the Oxfordshire side finished 10th in their first season in the second tier, including wins over Champ regulars Bedford Blues and Doncaster Knights.
Having been comfortably clear of the bottom two, Chinnor are now looking up ahead of the new season, with captain Luke Carter setting an ambitious target of being the best of the semi-professional sides in the league.
He said: “I’d like to think being top of the part-time teams is a good objective for us. It’s the second season in the Champ, I think we did quite well last year for a team just coming up. So that is the standard we are aiming for, being the best part-time in the Champ.
“We train pretty hard, only two nights a week. But we all get on really well, we’re good mates off the field and we enjoy playing together and play hard for each other.
“The majority of us, we’ve got a few people coming from further afield, but the majority are within a 5–10-mile radius so we spend a lot of time together.
“We like to throw the ball about a bit, we pride ourselves on our defence being pretty physical and we like to put pressure on teams, forcing them to make mistakes.
“We’ll throw it about when we get the opportunity to.”
It is all change in Champ Rugby this season with the return of the play-offs for the top six in the league, while at the bottom relegation returns with the bottom side dropping into National 1, while 12th and 13th will play off and the loser then facing a winner-takes-all clash with the second team from National 1.
In addition to that, matches will also be streamed on Ireland’s largest streaming platform, Clubber TV.
It marks the first time that all 182 league games, as well as the play-offs, will be available to stream on the subscription-only service.
For Australian centre Tommy Watson, who hails from Ballina, near Byron Bay, that is a gamechanger.
He said: “I’m Australian so my parents are cheering that it’s being streamed. All my family are back home so it will be good for them to tune in to Clubber TV.”
And as for the play-offs? Carter and Watson agree that a top-six challenge is not beyond the realms of possibility.
Carter said: “Being in that top six to play in the play-off finals and avoiding the relegation play-offs would be a big thing to aim for. I think we should be ok with that. Pushing for the top six would be nice.”
Watson added: “I think it gives us a target with being in the top six, to play in the finals for sure.”
