HEAD coach Mike Tewkesbury bemoaned a poor first-half performance as Redingensians Rams slipped to a 17-12 National Two South at Henley Hawks, writes Richard Ashton.

The visitors started poorly in front of a bumper crowd of 845, falling behind to a brace of tries by centre Liam O’Neil in the opening 10 minutes.

The Hawks forwards were dominant at both the set-pieces and breakdowns, and after Redingensians hooker Ben Henderson was sin-binned for pulling down a rolling maul, Henley were awarded a penalty try after battering the visitors at a series of scrums.

Reflecting on the opening 40 minutes, which saw Rams trail 17-0 at the break, Tewkesbury told the Chronicle: “We didn’t get out of the blocks. We had a bit of a hangover from the New Year and we didn’t display the same energy levels we have in previous games.

“I don’t know why that was, maybe it was the occasion. We wanted to concentrate on our performance and our game but perhaps we got to the stage where we were apprehensive and worried.

“We were anxious. Our line-out wasn’t as reliable as normal and fair play to them, they’d done their homework on us there.

“They got the points on the board and we had to chase the game.”

He continued: “One or two decisions were odd. I’m not a person for knocking the match officials but I felt one or two decisions I couldn’t tell where they came from. However, that didn’t influence the game."

Redingensians did fight back in the second period, dominating for vast passages of play as captain Robbie Stapley – returning to his former club – began to drive his side forward.

Wing Jak Rossiter gave Rams a lifeline when he collected a chip ahead to surge clear in the right-hand corner, and when replacement Colin Thompson broke through shortly after, the visitors had cut the gap to five points with a Jacob Adkins conversion.

Tewkesbury reflected: “In the second half we were much more in it. When we got the second try I felt we could go on and win the game. We made a couple of mistakes when we had opportunities.”

Rams were given a further boost when Hawks’ centre Connor Hayhow was yellow-carded for a high tackle, but despite Rossiter again showcasing his pace towards the end, he was hauled down and Rams were left with just a losing bonus point for their efforts. The defeat sees Redingensians drop to eighth in the table ahead of a home game against in-form Redruth (2pm) on Saturday.

The Cornish side impressed with a 29-12 victory against third-placed Chinnor on Saturday, and overcame Rams 10-8 in dreadful conditions earlier in the season.

Tewkesbury is looking for a reaction and admitted: “We’ve played them in three matches and we’ve lost two and drawn one.

“It will be a hard game but I think we can improve. I think we can move higher up the table. We’ve got a good bunch of players.”