CAMBRIDGE HEAD COACH CRAIG NEWBY MAKES CHANGES FOR THE GOOD FRIDAY TRIP TO CHINNOR IN CHAMP RUGBY ROUND 22
The game takes place at Kingsey Road, Chinnor on Friday 3rd April 2026 and kicks off at 5pm
Here’s Craig:
“It’s a short week for us which is probably not a bad thing because it simplifies our process, we don’t have to overthink, and we can concentrate on the things that are most important to us, and the things that we’ve got to get right from Saturday. Looking over the game a couple of times, we got 52% of our line outs against Bedford. I think we had five opportunities in the 22 that we missed, just from not executing our line out. It was a bit windy, so that did have an influence, but it’s something we need to get right against Chinnor, who’ve got the best line out defence in the league. We had 19 attacking rucks in the game, scored two tries from attack and one from a good defensive set. So,19 rucks in a game is not enough to put pressure on Bedford, and just to add some context, we’d normally be between 60 and 80 rucks in a game. We just didn’t give ourselves enough ball and didn’t keep the ball when we had it. Additionally, we missed 47 tackles, and only had 40% possession – so they had a lot of ball, we missed a lot of tackles and they capitalised, which is again a little bit unusual for us, we’re normally pretty good at making the tackles. Being in the right spots at the right time seems to be the issue.
“We missed Gareth Baxter and Rhys Fulford – they’re around the top of their positions in the Champ. Gareth’s a campaigner at this level and when he calls, when he’s on, we’re at 90% line-out. When he doesn’t, we’re around about 70%, so there’s a massive drop-off. And that’s something we’ve looked at off the field and on the field. We’ve been addressing to grow different options for the line-out calling leadership. It’s a difficult skill, but we look at what we’re capable of and what our ability allows us to do, and some of it’s down to player concentration and execution of their own roles. And, you know, when you have a good team in town, then those mistakes are amplified.And that’s what happened. Bedford scored four or five tries off transition moments when we did have the ball in good positions. So we just can’t do that this week. Chinnor are a tough team at home. Everyone thinks they just play a pretty pragmatic, aggressive style of rugby. And yeah, they do – but they also take opportunities. They’ll play the ball when it’s on. And they’ve got some dangerous backs. So we’re going to have to be very frugal with our turnovers this week. Otherwise they’ll just grind us and capitalise, like Bedford did.
“I’m expecting from us to keep it simple this week and look at the mistakes we made, particularly around our set piece and our execution around that, and make it really difficult for Chinnor. I’m expecting us to ‘turn up’ on Friday afternoon. It’s a five o’clock kick-off, which is quite unusual. The sun will still be out in the first half and there’s going to be a good crowd at Chinnor, I would imagine, on Friday night. They’re well supported and it gets pretty loud there, so I’m expecting our guys to turn up with loads of energy and show that passion and excitement for the game of rugby that, you know, despite how much you’re paid or how much you aren’t paid or where you’re from, rugby is a game of enjoyment and that’s what I expect to see. I felt like in the last two weeks we’ve probably been overwhelmed a little bit by the opposition before we even got to the game and this week could be one of those ones where we just go out and ‘play free’ – if we get those rugby things right then the energy and the excitement that they have should transfer into a performance that we’re more proud of”.
Gareth Baxter, Jake Ellwood and Rhys Fulford all return from injury this week and go straight into the starting line up. Northampton Saints second row is available again this week and also starts. Ethan Thorne is recalled to the wing – Leicester Tigers winger Kesena Izu is in action for England U19s – and Otu Mausia is back in the squad, also having recovered from injury.
Cambridge squad
15 Ben Currie
14 Ethan Thorne
13 Levi Reweti
12 Jasper Sorrell
11 Eli Caven
10 Jamie Annand
9 Ollie Allan
1 Jake Ellwood
2 Jack Doorey-Palmer
3 Billy Walker
4 Jack Lawrence
5 Gareth Baxter
6 Rhys Fulford
7 Dan Eckersley
8 Ben Adams (C)
Reinforcements
16 John Stewart 17 Francois Russouw 18 Paul Wulf-Masoe 19 Arthur Thomas 20 Chris Mills 21 Otumaka Mausia 22 Ruaridh Dawson 23 Joe Green