Nick Alway reports
It was all rather different meteorlogically when Norfolk referee , David Miles , last visited Duke's Meadows : then a reluctant Staines eventually agreed to turn out in what was soon to be dubbed "Goosegate" - in the only game of rugby to be played in the Home Counties that Saturday - after the snow had thawed in early December last year.

Now he was here on the hottest October day on record and, with the mercury nudging 30 degrees, the first and easiest decision for him to make was that there should be water breaks on the 20 and 60 minute mark.

He must have been surprised at the home side's lethargic start - even making allowances for its long injury roll. The twenty minutes before the first break certainly made disturbing viewing for the home support in what was a healthy and cheerful crowd. The somnambulant Stags were overrun initially by a vibrant Tring who had 15 unanswered points on the board before any sort of reveille had even been sounded . As soon there were some collective signs of wakefulness, however, matters did start to improve and on the quarter CS grabbed back a try.

A pacy Tring - who appeared to have the same intrinsic devil-may-care approach at heart as the home side - hit back immediately though with another converted winger's try to see them go into the real interval with a very healthy, if somewhat puzzling, 22-5 lead : puzzling as by no stretch of the imagination had Tring been dominating the forward exchanges, or possession, or territory. Those indicators at least gave continued grounds for some hope that there might be a revival and, indeed, that is just what transpired with two CS tries quickly scored through the forwards after the oranges' break and the gap narrowed to 19-25, Tring themselves having added a further penalty.

It was Tring who were melting - numerically certainly - in the heat with two offenders in quick succession consigned to the bin by Mr Miles for illegally killing the ball . They were arguably a little fortuitous not to lose a third too - but just as one of rugby's unwritten rules now is that a Nelsonian view will be taken towards the feeding of the scrum, another is that two men in the bin at the same is enough for any team to suffer. So - much to their credit - Tring emerged from a difficult period with their noses still ahead and , as so often happens, they then immediately scored a brilliant try on their first sally into CS's territory for a good while through their mercurial and always troublesome full back. Just as it seemed as if the pendulum was swinging CS's way it had swung the other and the game - as a contest if not as a spectacle - was effectively over.

Both sides continued throwing it around to the end and, with one more each, the try count moved on to 4-5 so there was the consolation at least for CS of a bonus point . Tring were certainly the better finishers on the day and deserved their win but there was still room for a certain amount of head scratching about how a side, undoubtedly shaded up front, had achieved it. The answer of course lies in the inherent difficulties involved in playing "catchy uppy" rugby and, indeed, this is essentially how coach Stefan Smith saw it : " We gifted 12 points in the first 10 minutes, which proved to be significant. However I could not fault the fight back in the second half. It was disappointing to get only 1 point, but definitely better than nothing. We have a few areas to address and hopefully our horrendous injury toll will ease in the forthcoming weeks."

Indeed so!

CS scorers:

Ben Bolton-Smith 3 x Conversions
James Glasson 1 x try
Tom Mitchell 1 x try
Cameron Reed 1 x try
Richard Melt 1 x try