Richie Williams has picked his squad for the first Championship outing of the season.
Here are the thoughts of the Cambridge Head Coach:
“It’s a big week for everybody in the Championship – this time last year we were in Chinnor’s shoes, preparing for our first foray, away at Ampthill. Chinnor come here this Saturday – we’ve trained well this week and are really focussed around what we have to do this weekend to get the outcome from the game we want and generate momentum for the rest of the season. I’m looking forward to hosting Chinnor – it’s a club that means a lot to me as I played a lot of my rugby there a while ago and still know people that are connected with the club. I’d’ve never have thought 20 years ago when I started playing there that I’d be coaching them in the Championship! Congratulations to everybody involved there – but I hope they don’t have too much fun this weekend! It’s a big occasion for both clubs”.
“I think for us what I’ve learned this pre-season is that we have a lot of ‘rugby IQ’ in this group, a lot of experience – we’ve got the nous to put pressure on the opposition, we talk a lot about building positive momentum, and you only do that in games by having positive actions. If you look at the chances we’re creating now we’re arguably stronger now than last time out. The next part of the jigsaw is to take those opportunities and score more points”.
There is one change from the starting XV at Aberavon in pre-season – George Bretag-Norris returns for Gareth Baxter in the second row. Baxter rotates to the bench. With scrum halves Pete White and Kieran Duffin unavailable, Matty Jones joins the Blood & Sand on an initial short-term deal after being released by Gloucester. He has over 60 Championship appearances for Hartpury and will make his debut from the bench. Joe Tarrant and Seb Brownhill both have knocks. Tom Hoppe and Matt Williams miss out.
Cambridge line-up: 15- Arthur Lennon 14- Josh Skelcey 13- Matt Hema 12- Ollie Betteridge 11- Eli Caven 10- Louis Grimoldby (CC) 9- Ruaridh Dawson 1- Jake Elwood 2- Ben Brownlie 3- Billy Walker 4- Kayde Sylvester 5- George Bretag-Norris (CC) 6- Iestyn Rees 7- Jared Cardew 8- Jack Bartlett 16- Morgan Veness 17- Zac Nearchou 18- Jake Bridges 19- Gareth Baxter 20- Ben Adams 21- Matty Jones 22- Sam Hanks 23- Joe Green