Chiswick 17 Totts 14

It was a ‘bad day at the office’ for Tottonians on Saturday after they were beaten at London 1 South’s lowly Chiswick.

Totts’ second row Ali Ramus said basic mistakes cost his side dear and their game plan never came together against the Londoners who won 17-14, writes Clive Downton.

Ramus said: “We knew all the pitfalls and knew it was a tricky place to go and we knew that they had given some teams a tough ride.

“We knew we couldn’t be complacent. We knew all of those things and talked about them and then fell into the pitfalls we had talked about. We just didn’t turn up as a team.”

Both sides were presented with chances to get on the scoreboard first during the opening half an hour.

Totts went close when skipper Robbie Searle missed a penalty kick by inches after 15 minutes.

Two passes were also judged forward by the referee as the visitors threatened the Chiswick line and a drop goal attempt from Pierre Clark sailed wide.

However the main reason for the stalemate was down to good defending from both sides.

The deadlock was finally broken by the home side who touched down via an overlap just before half time.

Totts put their missed chances behind them when they struck twice after the break.

First Nick Jones came in off the wing to cross the line following a scrum and Ali Ramus crashed over after Tottonians stole a line-out.

With Robbie Searle converting both, Tottonians were 14-5 up. Chiswick then turned the tables and won their own line-out and moved to within two points of their opponents with a following converted try.

They struck again with five minutes to go to wrap up their victory.

Ramus added: “It just didn’t come together. There wasn’t one thing you could say was the cause of the problem, it was just a combination of a lot of things.

“The biggest of all was mindset - it wasn’t right. Our set piece wasn’t particularly good, they scrummaged us off the ball and they were not a particularly big pack.

“It was just a bad day at the office.”

Havant moved above Totts and into fourth place following a 29-21 win at Gravesend.

A 62-5 home victory for leaders Sidcup over Gosport & Fareham confirmed the gap between the sides on the field as well as in the London 1 South table.

Bottom side Gosport conceded six tries during the game but did get over the line when they eventually entered their opponents’ 22 in the 62nd minute – scrum half Wes Dugan touching down.