Chinnor continue their preparations for the new season with a testing friendly at Championship side London Scottish tomorrow.
The National League 1 club returned to action last weekend at the Rams Festival, earning convincing wins over the hosts and Bournemouth in two one-hour matches.
With 33 players getting minutes under their belts in Berkshire, Chinnor are now looking to step it up a notch at Scottish, against whom they will play an 80-minute game split into two periods of 30 and one session of 20.
Matt Williams is hoping the friendly at Richmond Athletic Ground will provide the stern exam they require ahead of their season opener at Blackheath on September 7.
And Chinnor’s director of rugby is eager to see how his side will fare against a team which finished ninth in the Championship last year.
“This is a good test,” said Williams.
“They’re playing a small squad, they’ll be as strong as they can at this stage of the season, therefore it allows us to be a little more focused on what we do and don’t do.
“If you’ve got aspirations to be successful this year and be the right end of the table, you’ve got to stretch yourself.
“Graham Steadman’s got a good thing going on at London Scottish and it will be a big test for us this weekend and more of a truth of where we really are at.”
Scrum-half Jake Ashby is the only injury absentee from last weekend’s squad due to concussion.
There are a number of familiar faces in the Scottish set-up, with Josh Barton, Luke Hibberd, Ed Hoadley and James Tyas on the books.
Chinnor club captain Ben Manning is looking forward to lining up against his former teammates and the challenge of facing a team in the second tier.
He said: “I’m excited. It will be good to see a few familiar faces that we’ve either played against or played with.
“It’s a test we need to have.
“We’re looking to go into that league, so it will be good to see where we’re at and we’ll hopefully see them next season as well.”
