Petersfield earned a hard-fought 29-20 win against Chobham at Penns Place on Saturday in Regional Two South Central.

From the kick-off both teams gave no quarter and it was six minutes before the scoreboard moved as Jackson Clark broke from a ruck which had been patiently formed and driven forward and crossed the try line from ten metres out for fly half Nick Blumlein to convert.

The next ten minutes saw both teams struggling to keep possession of the ball for longer than three or four phases with big tackles and handling errors giving plenty of opportunities for rucks, scrums and lineouts.

On 15 minutes a Petersfield penalty lineout was lost and Chobham capitalised by launching their quick and strong left winger on a 40-metre dash for the line where a scrambled defence prevented a score but gave away a penalty.

From the tapped penalty Chobham took the ball over the line for an unconverted try to make it 7-5.

Petersfield scored their second try when Dan Sargent broke the gainline and Matt McLean used his pace and agility to run round the visitors’ defence and pass to the left of the pitch where Sam Brown latched on to the ball to rumble over the whitewash for an unconverted try.

On 35 minutes openside flanker Karter Whittock was injured and replaced by Franco Tomic, resulting in a reshuffle with Tomic going to number five, Liam Perkins to eight and Matt Momber to seven.

Chobham then scored their second try through an acute angled run to score under the crossbar, only for the conversion to be missed.

Petersfield then scored from a penalty lineout 15 metres from the try line on the left-hand touchline.

Brown’s throw found the towering Oli Hunt who dummied a pass to Joe Knowles but held on to the ball while pushing through the Chobham line to stride through their attempted tackles and score a converted try.

Four minutes before half-time Petersfield lost McLean for ten minutes to a yellow card.

Chobham, energised by the numerical advantage, hammered at Petersfield inside the hosts’ 22 but Petersfield’s determined and error free defence saw them safely through to the half-time whistle.

From the restart at the first breakdown Perkins saw yellow and joined McLean in the sin bin, leaving Petersfield with 13 players for a few minutes.

Chobham took full advantage and with accurate passing dragged Petersfield’s defence right and left to break through to score an unconverted try and make it 19-15.

McLean returned to the field but Chobham, still with a player advantage, recycled the ball from several excellent Petersfield defensive tackles and squeezed down the left-hand touchline to score a further unconverted try and go 20-19 ahead.

Petersfield regained the lead when Knowles scored an unconverted try.

Field scored their final try when Perkins picked up the ball from the base of a scrum, broke away and passed to McLean, who broke the Chobham line and passed the ball out to George Davis, who accelerated and dived over the line to the left of the posts for an unconverted try.

Sargent received a yellow card before the final whistle, but Petersfield produced a fine rearguard defensive display for the final five minutes.

Petersfield’s next match is away to second-placed Bournemouth on Saturday, February 15.

By Chris Todd