In quite atrocious conditions Harrow were thoroughly outplayed by the current league leaders who completely deserved their bonus point victory as their huge pack made much better use of the weather and the Brentwood infamous slope. Without the club captain Dave West and his brother and 1stxv skipper Chris West two of our biggest and most influential players together with Rob Franklin all injured it was going to be a large ask for a young and relatively inexperienced team with four players under 20 and whilst the players gave their all for the full eighty minutes it was at times an unequal contest

Harrow received the kick off playing up the infamous Brentwood slope and into the driving wind and rain and from the start it was Brentwood who made all the running as they used their big forwards to make the hard yards and kept Harrow imprisoned in their own 22. At 13 mins they got their first reward with a catch and drive from a five metre lineout which saw them score in the right corner. An excellent conversion from the touchline 7-0. Last week Harrow had dominated in the scrums this week an absolutely massive Brentwood front row caused the visitors problem after problem. At 17 mins from one such scrum on the Harrow 10 metre line the Brentwood no 9 who was perhaps the most influential player on view gout outside our defence and then drew the full back to put the winger over under the posts. It was a poor score to concede. Conversion made 14-0. At 23 mins a penalty kicked into the left hand corner gave the home team another five metre lineout. Another catch and drive and they were over again. Conversion made 21-0. Harrow finally got into the game and in one of their very rare excursions into the Brentwood 22 secured a scrum penalty to the left of the posts. A finely struck kick from Adam West 21-3 which was the score into the break. The sizeable Harrow contingent that had travelled to support the team must have thought that with the slope and the wind in the second half the visitors could ask some series questions of the home team. However to their credit Brentwood despite the conditions continued to be the dominant side of the half based around the efforts of their outstanding back and the prodding of their clever scrum half. At 52 mins Harry Reid was on his way to the bin for pulling down a maul and 3 mins later he was joined by Mark Gibson after the full back was penalised for kicking the ball in a ruck. Down to 13 Harrow showed real grit defending their line with passion and no little intelligence but in the end the lack of numbers proved too much and Brentwood got their bonus point try in the right hand corner. Conversion missed 26-3. At 65 mins having overturned a Harrow lineout 10 metres out from their own line the Brentwood scrum half had his kick charged down by Togher who then gathered and scored in the left hand corner. Conversion missed 26-8. Brentwood scored two further tries at 70 mins to the left of the posts converted 33-8 and then on 78 mins in the right hand corner. Conversion missed 38-8 which was the score at the end of the game.
The Lions meanwhile went down at Finchley in similar conditions 24-5. The match report by Howie Gosling is on the website

Andrew Smart