Chinnor 24 Barnes 17
As the clock ticked down to the 80th minute, Barnes were camped on Chinnor’s line searching for the score that would clinch a magnificent win for the visitors. The hosts, desperate to keep their promotion chances on track and their unbeaten home record this season, repelled wave after wave of attack. Somehow the ball got turned over and replacement scrum half Greg Goodfellow tapped and went through the merest of gaps.
Pulled down near the 10 metre mark, the ball was recycled and down the line it went to captain Danny Barnes who sliced through the defence. A shimmy here, an inside pass there to Junior Fatialofa and lock forward Ben Manning (how did he get there!), back to Barnes who dived over the line to win it at the death. Roddy Giles converted and brought this compelling game to a thrilling end.
Some two hours earlier Chinnor had welcomed Barnes to a sunny south Oxfordshire bolstered by new arrivals in scrum half Josh Davies, former London Welsh No 8 Ben Pienaar and prop Joe Hutchinson who started on the bench.
An early blood injury saw Barnes scrum half Franklin replaced by Hamish Reeves but they were well organised and after some sustained pressure were the first to score when captain Jamie Collins went over near the posts following a lineout 5 yards out. Tom O'Toole converted.
Chinnor looked for an immediate reply but were let down by a number of handling errors and solid Barnes defence. They did however begin to dominate the scrummage and from a scrum penalty on 17 minutes kicked to the corner, Josh Davies long pass found Bev Armitage in space and over he went. Roddy Giles missed the conversion but the hosts were off and running.
A superb line break by man-of-the-match Kieran Goss after 24 minutes was passed down the line from Armitage to Danny Barnes but several thrusts at the Barnes line came up short.
The main talking point of the first period came on the half hour. A break by Chinnor's winger Lamont was superbly off-loaded to Josh Davies who broke into the Barnes half. Davies was tackled head high by winger and Chinnor old boy Robbie Martey. The referee deemed this was worthy of a Red card under the new directive and also Yellow carded Chinnor prop Tom Price for retaliation.
From the resulting penalty, Chinnor kicked to the corner and hooker Jamie Townsend went over from the lineout. Roddy Giles slotted the conversion to make it 12-7 after 33 minutes.
With both sides down to 14 men, Barnes came straight back from the restart and from a lineout close to the Chinnor line were unlucky not to go over to tie the scores. With half time beckoning, Barnes again broke through but another try opportunity went begging.
With hooker Mark Darlington replacing Jamie Townsend and prop Joe Hutchinson on for his debut, the hosts looked to put pressure on the Barnes scrum at the start of the second half but despite gaining the upper hand they were mysteriously penalised on a number of occasions.
This was compounded when Number 8 Ben Pienaar was yellow carded on 54 minutes. O'Toole kicked the resulting penalty and the scoreline narrowed to 12-10.
It was Chinnor's turn to regroup and made a number of personnel changes. Greg Goodfellow replaced Davies at scrum half and Tom Burns came on for Richard Thorpe. The hosts continued to be frustrated. Lock Nathan Hanney went over after a storming run but was deemed to have been held up and full back Goss made a superb defence-splitting break but again it came to nothing.
To the bemusement of the home crowd it was Barnes who scored next when fly half O'Toole cut through the Chinnor defence to go over under the posts. His conversion put the visitors17-12 in front. With 15 minutes remaining, the hosts unbeaten home record was now under serious threat and this led to the most dramatic denouement to a game many will witness.
With nine minutes remaining Burns went over in the corner despite tremendous Barnes defending. Giles narrowly missed the conversion but the scores were tied 17-17.
The visitors weren’t done and from the restart were awarded what looked a kickable penalty to take the honours. It wasn’t to be for Tom O’Toole but Chinnor couldn’t clear and had to defend their line as the clock ran down. The last seconds will live long in the memory for Goodfellow et al.
The 24-17 bonus point win keeps the Villagers top and unbeaten at home but Barnes ran them very close and for that they have to be congratulated.
Teams
Chinnor
Kieran Goss, Charlie Broughton, Danny Barnes ©, Bevon Armitage, Henry Lamont, Roddy Giles, Josh Davies, Tom Price, Jamie Townsend, Jay Tyack, Nathan Hannay, Ben Manning, Richard Thorpe, Alex Bradley, Ben Pienaar
Interchanges: Joe Hutchinson, Mark Darlington, Tom Burns, Greg Goodfellow, Junior Fatialofa
Barnes
Oli Foster, Robbie Martey, Danny Holmes, James Hersey, Fraiser Carlisle, Tom O'Toole, Jack Franklin, Tom Galvin, Jonathan Kopra, Hugo Scott, Alex Crane, Jamie Collins ©, Matt Steele, Chris Scott, Rupert Crossland
Interchanges: Charles Wakefield, Ed Alterac, Rob Malaney, Hamish Reeves, Dave Butler
Scorers
Chinnor
Tries (time): Armitage 20, Townsend 34, Burns 71, Barnes 79
Conversions (time): Giles 35, 80
Penalty Goals (time):
Barnes
Tries (time): Collins 11, O'Toole 65
Conversions (time): O'Toole 12, 66
Penalty Goals (time): O'Toole 55,
Referee: Andrew MacNeaney
Attendance: 350
Half time score: 12-7
Full time score: 24-17
Star man: Kieran Goss - Chinnor
