Chichester – Preview
Played 3 and won all three with a bonus point to boot – the perfect record for league leaders Tottonians but they travel east to West Sussex on Saturday knowing that winning at Oaklands Park is not an easy prospect.
MATCH: Chichester v Tottonians
VENUE: Oaklands Park, Chichester, PO19 6AP
COMPETITION: Regional Division 2 South Central
DATE: Saturday 28th September 2024
KICK-OFF: 3:00pm
ADMISSION: FREE
LIVE MATCH UPDATES: On our Twitter/X channel @Tottonians
OVERVIEW:
Match number four of the league campaign sees Liam Murphy’s side go to Chichester hoping for better fortunes than they endured earlier on this year in our final away league game of the 2023/24 season.
In an attritional game in March, the light blues claimed an 18-12 victory which put paid to all hopes that Tottonians had of finishing in the top two places and was their third loss in the space of five games.
Things have been better for green, black and whites with three bonus point victories, although the last two against Petersfield and Bournemouth were nail-biters extreme, especially the latter which required an 85th minute score to put Totts ahead for the first time in the contest.
Chichester, who are in seventh place in the table with one win and two defeats from their opening trio can certainly look back at the games and think ‘what if’ as they lost by a single point to North Dorset 25-24 and by ten points in a high-scoring contest with Petersfield last weekend 42-32. Their victory came in week one at home to Newbury 31-27 so they have not in shortage of scoring points!
What is for certain is that it will be a tough afternoon of invigerating rugby between two free flowing sides – and all support will be most welcome.
TEAM NEWS:
Rich O’Donnell’s injury that ruled him out of the game with Bournemouth just before kick-off keeps him on the sidelines so the forwards remain unchanged from the eight that started.
Josh Andrews returns to the centre in place of the unavailable Jamie Laing which is the only change from the XV that kicked off against Bournemouth. Bruno Nascimbane takes a seat on the bench having missed the last two weeks while Josh Raqio joins his brother Kevin in the match day squad for the first time since the latter’s return to the club.
HISTORY and STATS:
This will be the ninth league meeting between the sides and the side from the Cathedral City have a 5-3 head-to-head advantage.
Tottonians also don’t have the best record at Oaklands Park either, recording just a single victory in four, that coming on 8 September 2018 in London 1 South 30-22. Totts lost in 2009 8-3 and 2017 24-17 as well as March this year 18-12. It is definitely not a lucky playing field for the visitors. 
