National League Two South Bury St Edmunds 20 Chinnor 50 Chinnor underlined their title aspirations with an accomplished performance at an arctic Bury St Edmunds.
The home side, grieving from the loss of ex-president Gerry Lowden, battled valiantly but the sheer size and power of the visitors proved irresistible.
Chinnor ran in six tries to Bury’s two and the architect of their early dominance was fly half Basil Strang, who, given the luxury of playing behind a pack of forwards in the ascendancy, orchestrated affairs to great effect.
His own converted try after just eight minutes set Chinnor on their way and his penalty extended the lead to 10 points before Scott Lyle landed two penalties, the latter from almost 50 metres, to drag Bury back into the contest at 10-6.
Bury had determination and effort in buckets, but Chinnor had too much pace and power, going on to score three more tries in the half.
No 8 Tom Burns helped himself to a brace whilst flanker Alex Bradley pounced on an over-thrown Bury line out.
Bury’s sombre spirits were raised just before the break when a period of fine play was rewarded with a well worked try for Lyle in the corner. His fine touchline conversion narrowed the gap to 29-13 at the interval.
Early Bury optimism was soon dashed when substitute scrum-half Goodfellow rounded off a flowing move, his outstretched arm just long enough breach the whitewash.
To the delight of the home support, Bury were awarded a penalty try after a series of drives in front of the grandstand was dragged down once too often for referee Dan Collins and at 36–20 Bury entertained hopes of perhaps a bonus point.
That door was firmly slammed shut by a ruthless Chinnor side, who continued to pummel the brave Bury defence. Pineaar, Hannay and Burns carried superbly committing more and more Bury defence until the space was created for winger Lamont to edge over on the hour.
The final 20 minutes were characterised by the Chinnor pack trying to bludgeon their way through.
A series of scrums close to the Bury line led to the inevitable penalty try and with that any faint hopes of a Bury comeback vanished.
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